


Shot in the Dark

by Smiling_Penelope



Category: The Grisha Trilogy - Leigh Bardugo
Genre: #LetAlexeiLive, Alina calls Aleksander a nerd, Alina gets Tinder matched with Vasily?!, Alina is 23 and the Darkling is 27, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Apparently Nikolai likes graveyard froyo, Are tea puns okay to do as well? No? Oh well I'm not sorry about that either., Artist Alina, Artist Darkling, But one of them does get wet! ;), Coffee Puns, Coffee is his shadows, F/M, Grishaverse, Guess who's a mamma's boy, Like reallllyyyyyyy Slooooooooow. And I'm not even sorry about it., Nikolai and Alina will never look at brownies the same way again, Nikolai is a cocky angel sent from above!, No it does not go well, Not in that way- geez get your mind out of the gutter! :P, Puppies are also his shadows, Seriously though- get Alina more food, Slow Burn, Starving Artist, This story got really out of hand- but y'all seem to like it sooooooo here we go!, Tolya and Tamar will kill you with cuteness!, shadow and bone - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-14
Updated: 2018-10-09
Packaged: 2018-12-01 22:04:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 28
Words: 115,880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11495664
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Smiling_Penelope/pseuds/Smiling_Penelope
Summary: Alina had two simultaneous thoughts of‘damn, he’s hot!’and‘oh no, douchebag incoming!’“You aren’t too busy to do a large order right now, are you?” He said in a low voice that caused her stomach to attempt acrobatics.Oh god, she was staring at him with her mouth open wasn’t she?Shit, shit, shit! Talk NOW!A modern day alternate universe where Alina is a starving artist working as a barista with Alexei and Nikolai. The Darkling is mysteriously handsome customer who takes interest in Alina. Oh, and she lives with Mal which greatly complicates everything.Get ready for the coffee puns!





	1. Pun Intended?

_It may not be the best use of my art degree, but at least it makes people smile_ , Alina thought as she handed a 12 ounce hot chocolate to the little girl. Her small face lit up when she saw the chubby penguin doodle on the side of the cup and she eagerly tugged at her father’s sleeve. “Look at the penguin, Daddy! Ahh! It’s so cute!”

“What do you say?” The father asked with a warm smile and prompting voice.

“Thank you!” the little girl squealed. Her face then became puzzled. “How did you know I like penguins?” she asked, tilting her head like an adorable puppy.

Alina looked from the little girl’s shirt to the stickers on her backpack to the clips in her hair, all of which featured penguins heavily. Out of the corner of her eye she could see the father shaking with restrained giggles at his daughter.

“Just a lucky I guess!” Alina said while holding back her own laughter.

“Wooooow!” the little girl oohed as she hopped up and down, almost spilling the hot drink.

As the father and daughter were leaving the shop Alina could hear the little girl plead, “Can we come back here next time?” and the father chuckled as he assured her that they definitely could.

Alina’s heart ached at the sight. Seeing happy parents and children never failed to do her in. It was one of her weaknesses and she always made sure, no matter how busy she was, to draw a quick doodle for the little ones. She stared at the retreating figures until an elbow to her ribs shook her out of her reverie.

“Nice job with the penguin!” She heard her teasing coworker’s voice in her ear as he leaned into her. “Next time can you get the dad’s number though? He was so hot!”

Alina swatted at the boy. “Alexei! He’s like 15 years older than us!”

“No way! With those arms, I’d place him at 8 years older than us max!” He had a far off look in his eyes that suggested he was imagining the buff father’s arms around him. Maybe as he carried him over the threshold of their new house in the suburbs.

“Would you stop ogling the customers?” Alina snapped, but her words had no venom to them. “Besides, don’t you have that second date with Tinder-Girl tonight? Don’t be a player.”

“Oh, I’m sure if Eva saw that fine specimen she would understand.” His eyebrows waggled suggestively and Alina might have swatted at him again if he wasn’t holding a pitcher of scalding liquid.

“Besides, the phone number would be for you! Despite what you might think, he wasn’t too old for you. Plus, an experienced man might do you some good, Little Saint.”

 _Okay, that’s it!_ She thought. Now that Alexei was no longer holding any liquids she launched a well-aimed coffee lid at him. It hit him square between the eyes and he squealed like he had been mortally injured. “Uncalled for!” He exclaimed, rubbing at the red mark the plastic had left.

“Don’t call me ‘Little Saint!’ You know I hate that name!” She grumbled at him.

 _You casually mention that you are a virgin ONCE and look what you get!_ Alina thought as she was preparing to strangle her coworker.

“Now, now, Little Saint! You know we are just looking out for you.”

Alina groaned as Nikolai in all of his surfer-boy perfection came out of the back room, obviously having heard all of the embarrassing comments Alexei had made.

The two boys had made it their personal mission to get Alina out into the dating world and finally over her childhood crush. She knew that they meant well, but it was really none of their business and it made her feel like some sort of sexless charity case. And she had had enough of that in her life. Being a charity case that is.

Alina had grown up in the foster care system and she was very much over others pitying her. All her life she had to deal with long stares, shaking heads, and hollow words of encouragement. Now that she was an adult she was as fiercely independent as she needed to be. She worked two jobs and did caricatures in the park on weekends to get by, but it was worth it. She didn’t owe anybody anything. Well, except for the mountain of student loans that the bank constantly threatened her with.

She threw up her hands in frustration. “You two are the worst! And _you-,_ ” she prodded a finger at Nikolai, “are 5 minutes late from your 10-minute break!”

The boy didn’t even try to look guilty, instead throwing her his trademark cocky smile. “Time is a mere illusion, my dear!”

She found herself caving to his bright blue eyes and groaned in surrender. _Curse his ridiculously good looks and even more ridiculous nature._

They continued with shift amicably enough. Alina doodled quick flowers or animals on the customer’s cups as she absentmindedly listened to the boys prattle on.

The morning light was streaming through the large storefront windows and Alina had to admit the effect was pretty. The coffee shop where she worked her main job was way too hipster for her taste, all exposed metal and concrete juxtapositioned with live edge wood. It was crowded with overstuffed armchairs in carefully mismatched patterns and shapes.

Alina would be a hypocrite if she judged the furniture for its lack of coordination, she had never owned anything matching in her life. But as all of her furniture was bought from thrift stores she guessed that the its total worth would be nowhere near as expensive as just one of the faux distressed chairs.

There was something about the décor of the coffee shop that she reserved the right to judge. All of the artwork in the place looked like it belonged in a stock art album. Which was in contrast to the gorgeous chalk art adverts that she and Alexei made every day. The least the coffee chain could do would be to source their art from local artists. And who was more local then one’s own employees?

She sighed as she stared at a little drawing of a smiling snow sheep on a 16 ounce cappuccino. _One day_ , she thought, _my art will hang in galleries, not confined to marker on disposable cups_. As much as she liked creating her doodles, it still hurt a bit to see them staring back at her as they were thrown in the trash.

“You aren’t thinking about lover boy again are you? Why not go for someone handsomer? Or blonder? We have more fun you know!”

Alina just rolled her eyes at Nikolai, not wanting to give into his teasing.

For once she hadn’t been thinking of Mal, her childhood crush. _I guess all it takes is thinking about my failure as an artist to take my mind off of my love life, or lack thereof._ She thought wryly. Ever since he had come careening into her lonely life she hadn’t been able to take her eyes off of him. She was in love with him before she even knew what love was.

But he had never loved her back, not in that way. It didn’t matter how close they were or how much they shared, they were firmly planted on this side of friendship. But even as close as they had been as children they were starting to grow apart as they grew older. It was like, even their friendship couldn’t hold them together anymore. Both having secrets and parts of their lives they no longer shared, one of them being Alina’s unrequited love. Living together hadn’t seemed to help either.

Although, really what had she thought? That Mal would suddenly realize he was madly in love with her after finding her hair clogging the shower drain? No, he treated her the same as he always had when they shared the same foster houses for lucky periods of time.

 If anything, living with him was helping her to get over him. The endless parade of women in various stages of clothing was starting to disenchant her. And what had once felt like deep cuts to her heart every time she heard muffled giggles or found discarded clothing in the living room now was more of a slight sting.

It had only taken two years of living together, countless tearful bowls of ice cream with Alexei, and the distractions of her destruction of her promising art career.

On a more positive note, she guessed it also hadn’t hurt to have some interest on Tinder. Alexei had signed her up against her will, stealing pictures from her Facebook page and even going so far as to swipe right on a couple of prospects. She had actually gotten some messages and some of them were pretty cute, not that she had responded yet.

The stream of customers was starting to slow to a trickle as the morning rush was concluding and Alina was starting to consider taking her 10 when a smartly dressed customer came up to her till. He had strikingly beautiful grey eyes framed by thick eyelashes that were absolutely unfair and head of neatly parted black hair.

Alina had two simultaneous thoughts of _‘damn, he’s hot!’_ and _‘oh no, douchebag incoming!’_

“You aren’t too busy to do a large order right now, are you?” He said in a low voice that caused her stomach to attempt acrobatics. He looked visibly agitated with a slightly stiff posture, but his tone was polite enough.

Oh god, she was staring at him with her mouth open wasn’t she? _Shit, shit, shit! Talk NOW!_

“Y-yes! Um how many drinks are you, umm, ordering?” She cringed internally at the way her voice sounded to her, high and squeaky.

He pulled a piece of paper from a pocket of his well-tailored suit. “15 drinks total and 7 food orders.”

She blinked for a second. She had done larger orders before for sure, except they had always been ordered at least a few hours in advance. But her mouth moved faster than her rational mind.

“Oh sure! We can totally do that! Can’t we guys…” She turned expecting to see Nikolai and Alexei nod in agreement. Instead she only found Alexei who looked at her dumbly, a glazed look to his eyes.

 _Oh crap._ She tried to backtrack a bit. “It will take a bit, probably about 15 minutes? Especially if you want any of the food heated.”

He looked at her calmly, unperturbed. “Can you do it in 10? I’m in a bit of a rush and the food doesn’t need to be hot.”

She felt lost in his eyes, but managed to tear away for a second to look at Alexei. In a matter of seconds, they had an entire conversation based on looks alone, ending with Alexei’s fervent nods of agreement.

 _I guess that’s it. Better prepare for the rush of a lifetime then._ At least there were no other customers waiting in line. There had to be at least one saint on their side.

“Okay, hit me!” She said as she turned back to the business man. _Oh god, did she have to be so awkward?_

He started to list off the drinks as she frantically scribbled on cup after cup, forgoing her usual doodles. Some of them were straight forward, but others were more complicated like “12 ounce coconut milk latte with 1 pump hazelnut sweetener and 2 pumps sugar free hazelnut sweetener” or “16 ounce of iced caramel macchiato in an 18 ounce cup with extra ice” or the always dreaded “Firebird Frappuccino” which involved both a mango mix and a strawberry mix swirled with grapefruit syrup and topped with carbonated candy dust. He then recited the 7 food items which were, thankfully, all available in the display case. He handed her the slip of paper for reference.

The words on it were in thin, spidery cursive, but surprisingly legible and she set the paper on the counter next to her. Alexei was already through the first 3 drinks, moving at an impressive speed and Alina started to enter the drinks into the cash register.

She was almost done entering in the bagels and pastries as well when the man spoke again. “Would it be too much trouble to add a 16 ounce shot in the dark?”

 _Polite, not a douchebag then, just a hottie._ “No problem!” she said aloud with an overly large smile and added it to the total. Once he had paid and walked to the other end of the counter, she picked up a 16 ounce cup to add the last minute order.

“You have to draw something on his!” Alexei hissed at her. “If you don’t, I swear on the saints that I will steal your phone and start responding back to your Tinder matches!”

She shushed him, already starting the doodle and trying not to dwell on the horror of Alexei’s threat.

Not really knowing why, she drew and filled in a black circle, then added a white sliver to one side. She finished it off with short, straight lines radiating from the sliver. A sun in eclipse. It wasn’t as cutesy or even as complex as most of her doodles. But the clean lines and simple shapes somehow seemed to suit the man.

Since the drink was uncomplicated she made it right away, instead of starting on the other drinks first. Once it was finished she scooted around Alexei to place it on the bar. “Here’s yours to drink while you wait for the rest of them!” For once her voice came out normal, confident even. _Nice!_

He came to pick up the beverage and started to take a drink, the doodle facing away from him. Then disaster struck in the form of her damn mouth. “I wasn’t sure if it was for you or someone else, but I guess I… took a shot in the dark.”

 _No. Oh saints, why?_ She wanted to sink into the ground. _A coffee pun? Really? This is why you can’t have nice things, Alina!_

Before he could respond she spun around, a blush forming on her face, and started on the next drink. She thought she could hear a faint chuckle, but decided she was deluding herself.

“Real nice, Alina!” Alexei whispered sarcastically.

She just glared at him.

They managed to finish up the order in a record 9 minutes and loaded it up into the specialized carriers. Once she was sure that nothing would spill she called out in a voice that she hoped sounded cheerful and not crazed, “All done!”

He deftly picked up the carriers after placing his own drink in one of the spots Alina had left open for it. Thanking them he started to walk away, but then paused in front of the tip jar. “Nice doodle,” he said casually, like he wasn’t giving the girl palpitations, and he dropped a bill into it.

Alina managed to choke out a strangled “Thank you!” of her own and he left without looking back. Outside the shop she saw what looked to be a really nice black car ‘beep-beep’ and unlock before he climbed in gracefully.

“A shot in the dark?! Really, Alina?! This is why you can’t have nice things!” As if reading her mind, Alexei yelled at her loud enough to cause a couple of the patrons already sitting with their drinks to turn their heads.

She groaned, clutching her head as she sunk to the floor.

Nikolai then came sauntering out of the back room again, oozing charm and nonchalance. “What happened?” He enquired innocently.

“Where were you?” the other two chimed in unison, Alina finally managing to find her words through anger.

“I was taking my 10, didn’t I tell you?”

“Not fair! You don’t get two 10’s in 3 hours! We just had to do the largest order in the world!” Alexei wailed throwing a couple of stir sticks at him.

Alina let out another groan that was ignored by her coworkers.

Nikolai took the attack in stride then leaning across the till he looked into the tip jar and made a choking noise. “There’s a hundred-dollar bill in here!”

That shut up Alexei immediately and caused Alina to shoot to her feet. She snatched the bill that Nikolai had extracted from the jar to inspect it. Alexei then snatched it from her, but not before she was sure it was real.

“Who leaves a 100-dollar tip for coffee?” Nikolai asked incredulously.

“Oh my god, Alina! Either I’m much hotter than I thought, or he really liked your drawing!” Alexei exclaimed then paused for a second as if considering. “Well either that or your boobs, because it definitely wasn’t your pun.”

At that, she hit him on the arm, hard, not caring what proper co-worker etiquette was. “Shut up! It has to have been a mistake! He probably thought he was leaving a 10-dollar bill or even one dollar.”

Nikolai started to whine wanting to know what the pun was and Alexei answered while Alina took back the money and stared at it. After a moment she grabbed a sticky note and jotted down “Black hair, grey eyes, nice suit, black sports car, order #050612” then stuck it to the bill.

“What are you doing?” Alexei asked, looking at her like she had finally lost it.

“We can’t keep it Alexei! It has to be a mistake. He’s going to come back and want his money, so I’m stashing it in the till for him.” She explained as she unlocked the cash register.

“But that’s like, almost double what you’re going to make this shift! Plus, it’s my money too!” Alexei’s whining was back in full force.

Nikolai didn’t say anything, which was probably for the best as Alina was ready to tear out his eyes.

“Shush! I’m sure he meant to leave less money.”

Alexei pouted as she closed the drawer. Trying to laugh off the whole encounter Alina continued “Besides, my boobs totally aren’t worth 100 dollars.”

“I beg to differ.” Nikolai pipped up with a suggestive smile.

“Uhhgghhh!” Alina exclaimed in frustration, hitting Nikolai as well.

She headed for the back room ignoring Nikolai’s moans of “Oow! That’s assault!”

“I’m taking my 10, jerks.” She called over her shoulder as she closed the break room door behind her.

The room was cool and dim which was the perfect relief for her rapidly developing stress headache. She made her way over to a box of napkins and sat on it, not caring if it wasn’t the most sanitary. _The packets are covered in plastic, so it should be fine, right?_ Besides it was just so much more comfortable than the metal chairs crammed around a wobbly card table.

She sighed, pulling her knobbly knees up to her chin. _Why do I have to be such an insufferable dork?_ She thought to herself as she rubbed at her tired eyes. _Maybe if I didn’t have to work two jobs I’d be less tired therefor less awkward…_

 _… nah, probably not._ She snorted at herself into her knees. She could sleep for 80 years straight and she would be just as socially incapable as ever.

 _But he had liked my drawing! Enough to leave a tip!_ It didn’t matter if he had meant to tip one dollar or ten, she refused to believe that he had tipped a hundred dollars on purpose, no matter how nice his suit or car looked. _But he still tipped!_

 _Ah! I can’t wait to tell Genya!_ She thought as she blushed into the darkness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Omg you guys! This was so much fun to write, you have no idea. I've been doing another Grisha fan fic which is way more serious, so I thought I'd pick up a fluffier work as well!
> 
> I hope the dialog flows well enough! They aren't very talkative in my other fic, so this is definitely a change of pace! :P
> 
> Anyways, I hope the coffee stuff is accurate enough! I've never worked as a barista (or even owned a coffee maker lol) so I'm a bit out of my depth! I think that 15 drinks and 7 pastries would be a feat in 10-15 minutes, but who knows!?
> 
> In the next chapter we will be getting into the art stuff as well, and you will get to find out what happened to Alina's art hopes and dreams. (I've also never been to art school so here we goooo!)
> 
> 'Shot in the dark' = A drip coffee with a shot of espresso. Also known as a 'red eye' to some.
> 
> Hope you liked it! Until next time!!


	2. Shu Food and Shu Secrets

“-and then I said _I guess I took a shot in the dark_.” Alina winced as she retold the more embarrassing parts of her run in with the hot customer earlier that day.

“You didn’t!”

“Oh, but I did.”

“No!”

“Yes.” Alina said with a groan. “Can we please move past it now?”

“You said a coffee pun to- and I quote you- _the tastiest business man to ever set foot into the Ravkan Brew_?!?” Genya exclaimed dramatically, gesticulating with her makeup sponge.

Alina groaned again, regretting ever having started this conversation and resignedly letting her face fall into her hands.

“You’re going to mess up your makeup again!” Genya snapped as she tugged on Alina’s arm.

They were in the middle of their pre-shift ritual where Genya attempted to make Alina look like she knew anything about makeup. This was Alina’s second job, working at a high end makeup boutique, and it was a job she was wildly underqualified for. The only reason she had gotten it, and hadn’t been fired, was through Genya’s connections and magic with a concealer wand.

It was really a miracle that she hadn’t been found out yet. Alina didn’t even own any makeup herself. She found it to be too expensive, too much of a hassle, and it never turned out right when she applied it herself. All of her knowledge came from her gorgeous best friend who had a knack for stepping in whenever Alina needed help with customers.

In return for Genya’s support Alina supplied her with a constant supply of 16 ounce dirty chai lattes. Each disposable cup decorated with a happy doodle of a flower. It didn’t really matter what type of flower, Genya seemed to love them all.

“But he liked your doodle?” She said as she dabbed life-giving foundation over Alina’s washed-out face. “And he tipped you! So it couldn’t have been that bad.”

Alina hadn’t told Genya how _much_ the man had tipped her. She was already sick of arguing with Alexei and Nikolai about it and didn’t want to rehash the conversation. Instead she sat obediently still as Genya worked on her makeup, launching into her recurring pep talk.

It was all “you got to get out there Alina,” and “if you’d just let me set you up with-,” or “just because Mal is a self-obsessed prick-,” always ending with “Okay, Alina? I mean it. You are the sweetest person I know and you deserve better!” It was nice and better received than Alexei and Nikolai’s meddling, but it still grated on Alina.

Once Genya finished Alina’s makeup she chugged the last of her dirty chai which made Alina wince a bit. She hated it when people finished their drinks even after they had cooled. Genya chuckled at Alina’s face, knowing that it bothered her.

Then, in a heartwarming gesture, Genya took out her phone to snap a picture of her cup before she disposed of it. “I really liked that one, you know? It was cool how you drew the daffodils around my name.”

“It only took a couple seconds…” Alina trailed off avoiding the compliment, but still feeling a small curl of pride in her chest.

Genya rolled her eyes at her. “You know that just makes it more impressive, right?”

Alina didn’t immediately respond, instead heading into the boutique. “We’re going to be late again!” she called over her shoulder. She knew that if she turned around she would see Genya rolling her eyes even harder with a familiar exasperated smile.

Their shift passed quickly enough with constant flow of customers that never became too overwhelming. Alina worked the cash register and Genya prowled the store answering questions and hoping to convince people to let her do complimentary makeovers on them. In all her time working at the boutique, Alina had never seen anyone disappointed with the makeover and eighty percent of the time they bought one or more of the products Genya had used on them.

It wasn’t like they worked on commission. Genya just loved makeup and giving people to power to change their own appearances. Once a twelve-year-old girl had asked her to make her look like a tiger and Genya had practically dragged her to her makeup chair. The mother had trailed behind them insisting that Genya didn’t need to go to the trouble, but she had just waved her off excitedly.

In a matter of minutes, the little girl sported a dramatic cat eye look with bright orange and red eyeshadows that complimented her dark brown skin. Genya had even gone so far as to apply a light pink nose and whiskers. When the girl saw her faced revealed she practically combusted with glee, begging her mother to buy the makeup. Instead of trying to pitch them the expensive makeup, Genya had covertly written down a list of much cheaper drugstore dupes and set the two on their way.

There was nothing remarkable about their shift today, but Alina felt uncharacteristically cheerful at the end. She even tagged along with Genya to try and schmooze some free leftover food from the Shu restaurant on the other side of the street, not that they actually had to try that hard. The tall boy working there seemed to see them from a mile away and he had two neat packages of food ready for them by the time they got through the door.

He handed the food to them with a conspiratorial grin. “Just don’t let my sister see you.”

Which was funny because just last week his sister had given them food on the condition that they swear not to tell her brother.

“Hey Toyla, can you reach this for me?” a voice called out from the back room.

The boy’s eyes went wide with fear and he made a shushing gesture to Alina and Genya before calling back, “Why can’t you reach them yourself?”

“Because I was cursed with a giant for a brother, that’s why! Don’t make me come out there!” the voice called again, sounding more agitated.

“Just a second, Tamar!” The boy cried guiltily as he shoved two giant handfuls of napkins and plastic utensils at the girls. “Go, go, go!” he whispered frantically as if all of their lives were in danger.

Alina and Genya ran from the store, giggling wildly.

“Those two!” Alina exclaimed once they were out of sight from the restaurant and had caught their breath. “Do you really think they don’t know that they are both sneaking us food?”

Genya laughed and said, “I have no idea, but either way it’s hilarious and we get free food.” Then she pouted, “but they always give me less food when you aren’t there.”

“Yeah, because there are two of us.”

“No, the box they give me has less food in it when you aren’t there. They like you better!” She held up her takeout container accusingly. “Maybe even like-like.” Her eyebrows waggled.

“You’re delusional.” Alina retorted.

“And you’re oblivious.” Genya’s voice had grown softer and Alina could feel the undercurrent of a pep talk coming her way. _Not this again,_ she thought as she diverted the conversation and sped up her pace slightly.

“What are you doing this weekend?” she asked causing Genya’s eyes to narrow suspiciously.

“I know what you’re doing and it’s not going to work, Starkov.”

“You going to hang out with… what’s-his-face again?”

“It’s David, and for a matter of fact yes I am.” Genya said haughtily, mildly affronted by her crush being called ‘what’s-his-face.’

Alina smiled a little to herself. She had ‘forgotten’ his name to distract Genya who had immediately fallen into her trap. They then launched into a long conversation about the boy, what his texts (or lack thereof) meant, microanalyses of his facial expressions, and what Genya should wear on their next ‘date.’ By the end of the conversation, Alina honestly wasn’t sure if the poor boy knew Genya was interested in him.

The topic managed to last them all the way to Genya’s apartment and Alina almost let out a sigh of relief when they parted ways. She loved Genya, she really did. And Alexie and… _well probably not Nikolai_. But, they could all be so nosey and meddling. If she really wanted to date someone else she would.

 _I guess that’s the point. To get me to focus on someone other than Mal._ She thought, her feet shuffling through newly fallen leaves. She liked the shushing sound they made as she slogged through them and she occupied herself by wandering through every leaf pile she could find on her way. This slowed her down tremendously, taking her 10 extra minutes on what should have been a 20-minute walk from Genya’s apartment.

 _Oh well, it’s not like I have anything better to do tonight. Mal certainly won’t be waiting up for me._ She gave into a sigh as she opened the small rusty gate that led to their barren front lawn.

As Mal had been pulling away from her, they had started hanging out less and less. He chose to spend most of his nights at some girl’s place, at their place with some girl, or sloshed at the local pub with Mikhael and Dubrov. This made her equal parts annoyed and concerned. There were some nights where she would lay awake until she heard his keys or in the door, cursing him under her breath for worrying her.

She made her way carefully across the uneven stepping stones leading to the dilapidated front porch. Their house was a dump, there was no way around it. Most of the windows were cracked or stuck shut from the sagging weight of the walls, the white siding was chipped and dirtied, and ivy was starting to consume the back half of the house. And that was just the exterior. Inside the walls were tinted yellow with time, the floors were almost comically uneven, and the plumbing was dubious at best.

It wasn’t anywhere near perfect, but it was home, their home. They probably could have afforded a nicer apartment, probably closer to both of their jobs, but after a childhood full of uncertainty they had both wanted an actual house. It had been one of their whispered dreams.

So they had done everything they could to renovate the tiny two-bedroom house. Alina had thrifted colorful sheets to cover the most rundown of the walls and Mal had duct-taped the life out of almost every single pipe in the place. Together they had added extra supports surrounding the worst of the windows and in the winter they covered them with thick blankets to prevent chill.

The rest they just dealt with by trying to find a sense of humor. They raced marbles along the floor, used the ivy to climb to the roof, and turned on the kitchen sink when the other was in the shower causing the water to either become scalding or freezing.

And for a while it was enough, their laughter filling in the cracks of the house better than any glue could. But it had been a while since they had laughed together.

When Alina went to unlock the door she belatedly noticed that the lights in the living room were on. She turned the handle and it gave way without resistance. _Mal has company_ , she thought. _I just hope it isn’t-_

“Mikhael! Dubrov!” she greeted the two boys taking up her sofa with forced enthusiasm as she set her keys and food down on the entryway table, shrugging off her coat.

“Ayyyy, Sticks! That food for us?” Mikael called with an insolent grin on his face.

‘Sticks’ was Mikael and Dubrov’s favorite nickname for her. It was an unwanted comment on her painful thinness and inability to gain weight no matter how hard she tried. Mikael had originally come up with it, but the two of them had both run with it. They said it so much and so often that Alina felt like they were trying to erase her actual name.

“Ha! It’s not like Sticks is going to eat it herself!” Dubrov said with a laugh and elbow into Mikaels side.

Alina could feel her cheeks blanch with apprehension. _It’s okay. You’re okay. You just have to make it to your room and you’re good._ She hated these boys, who constantly called her names and made fun of her with every breath.

Mal called it teasing. She called it harassment.

And of course he was never around when they said or did the worst things. He was always off with some girl, leaving Alina to fend for herself. Which she could do, Alina was hardened after her time in the foster care system. She was a pro at talking circles around the two and keeping her distance when they were drunk off their asses on kvas. But it would have been nice to have her friend, _her best friend_ , stick up for her once and a while.

At least they weren’t drunk… yet. Sometimes when they were sober they were actually palatable, but after they had knocked back a few they quickly became insufferable.

“Where’s Mal?” She asked with the same forced cheer. She casually hid her food behind her, hoping they would forget it. Given the chance they would take her food, despite her protests, and eat it all in front of her.

“Oh, he’s not here yet.” Mikhael said with a wave of his hand. “We’re going to go bar hopping once he’s off work.”

Alina’s stomached dropped. Had Mal given them a key? _I’m going to kill him._

She must not have completely hidden her dismay as Mikhael laughed at her and said, “We didn’t break in, Sticks. We just used the key under the garden gnome.”

This time she was better prepared, her face a strong mask of indifference. “Did you put it back?”

“Of course, Sticks!” Dubrov rolled his eyes, like a stupider question had never been asked before.

_The moment they leave I’m changing the location of the spare key and I’m not telling that jerk where._

She could see a flash of silver in Mikhael’s pocket, a poorly hidden flask. She had no idea why he had one if they were going to the bar, but she didn’t bother to ask. _Have they already started drinking?_

“Well, just make yourselves at home! I’m going straight to bed! Tired, double shift today!” Her voice was almost breathy with false nonchalance. She backed her way into the hallway, hiding her food behind her.

“Food?” Dubrov called after her.

“Get your own!” She called, turning on her heel and almost sprinting to her room now.

She could hear their raucous laughter and a snide comment about her makeup as she shut the door behind herself. “Assholes,” she whispered under her breath.

She didn’t have a lock on her door, but she wasn’t worried that they would come in. They were assholes, but the type that only had words at their arsenal, not sticks or stones. They had never invaded her private sanctum, no matter how drunk they were.

Still, she felt a rush of relief and slid down along the door to the floor. Not bothering to turn the light on, she pulled the food onto her lap and searched for a plastic fork. Instead she found about twelve napkins, two spoons, and a knife causing her to chuckle a little. She wondered if Toyla had done it on purpose to make her smile.

After she had finished as much of the food as she could eat with a spoon, she played solitaire on her iPhone 4. The thing was almost 6 years old and had a few permanent dark spots on it, but it still worked and she had bought it (used) with her first paycheck. She fiddled around with the brick of a thing until Mal came home and the three miscreants left together. She hadn’t bothered to greet Mal, purposefully hiding out until she was sure they were all gone.

She stored her food in the fridge, hoping it would still be there tomorrow. _Assholes._ Then she moved the spare key into the hollow of a nearby tree. Readying herself for bed she tried not to think about them or Mal. She picked out some warm clothes for tomorrow morning. She wanted to go straight to the park when she woke up, that way she could get in as many caricature commissions as possible.

When she finally settled into her bed and turned off the lights an image came to her, the handsome customer from earlier that day. She fell asleep blushing like a 12-year old, thinking of the way he said ‘nice drawing’ to her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wait a second. What happened to the coffee shop and didn't you promise us the destruction of Alina's promising art career in your last author note? And how did this get so angsty so fast?
> 
> ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ What can I say, Alina has feelings! lol, but I think the angst will be less intense in the upcoming chapters. And I reeaally promise this time that next chapter will feature artist Alina more heavily.
> 
> But hey, I gave you the worlds most adorable sibling duo! ;) Also, could Alina be more oblivious to like _everyone's_ advances?
> 
> Thanks for reading! I live on comments and kudos! :P Hope you had fun reading and I'll see you next time!


	3. An Even Worse Coffee Pun

Alina woke the next morning to the sound of her alarm clock blaring. She groaned as she reached over to turn off the incessant noise. It was 6 in the morning on a Saturday, which would be horrific to some, but for Alina she was sleeping in by 2 hours. On weekdays she worked the morning shift at the Ravkan Brew and had to wake up at 4 am so that she could be there by 4:45 am to open at 5 am. She had been working there for well over a year, but she had never quite adjusted.

Because it was a Saturday Alina let herself roll onto her back for a few more minutes. She didn’t dare close her eyes, afraid to fall back asleep. Instead she let them linger around her room in the morning light.

She had specifically picked this room over the other bedroom that Mal occupied. It was smaller, but its window faced east casting long sunbeams across her room in the morning. It was her favorite room in the house, decorated in sky blues, accented with golds, oranges, and yellows. She had managed to thrift a couple sets of old sheets with a cheery cloud print that she covered most of the walls and her bed with.

The ceiling was littered with what had to be hundreds of tiny glow-in-the dark stars. They were actually a gift from Mal and he had helped her to apply them shortly after they had first moved in. The stars radiated in wide spirals from the hanging lamp in the center of the ceiling. It had taken them an entire afternoon to put them all up. They had even required a ladder which they had both fallen off at one point from laughing too hard at each other’s jokes. She knew the stars were cliché, but it the memory of putting them up was fond and they were so pretty that she didn’t care.

The spaces on the walls that weren’t covered by sheets were plastered with her own artwork, suns and stars practically bursting off the sheets in kaleidoscopes of warm colors. They were her favorite things to draw and she gravitated towards them when she was feeling down or lonely.

She had a full size bed on a vintage metal bed frame that she had found in pieces on the side of the street and carried 6 grueling blocks back to the house. She had splurged on gold spray paint and even though the underlying rust had caused the paint to chip in some places the effect was still lovely.

The rest of her furniture was less charismatic, a dingy white dresser, a small oak wood desk with the worlds ugliest desk chair, and an old arm chair with a pattern that Alina loved to hate. The carpet was a 30-year-old shag in a navy color that was worn to the warped subfloor in multiple places.

Despite some of its flaws the room was her happy place. It was where she retreated when Mal brought guests over or when she was overwhelmed with her life. She sometimes thought that she wouldn’t care if the entire house fell down as long as her room remained standing.

After a few minutes of lazily staring around her space in appreciation, Alina got up with a sigh and got ready for the day. She decided that she wanted coffee that morning so she skipped breakfast as she knew she could get a free day-old croissant from the coffee shop. She was out the door in less than 15 minutes, braving the long walk to her workplace in the morning chill.

She was always fast in the morning, not really caring what she looked like as long as she was dressed and her hair was brushed. Otherwise she’d have to look at herself in the mirror, which was something she usually avoided. She knew she wasn’t hideous, but she just didn’t like the way her face looked. It didn’t help that she tended to picture the faces of all the women Mal had brought home and how she paled in comparison to them.

When she got to the Ravkan Brew she saw Nikolai was working the till and almost turned around, not wanting to deal with his over-familiarity on her day off, but her stomach rumbled with the promise of free food.

“Alina!” He called to her as she walked through the door, a large grin on his face and waving at her excitedly. “Make me a dry cappuccino!”

Alina glared at him. Not only was he completely ignoring the customer in front of him, he was being utterly lazy at her expense. “Why not make it yourself?”

“Yours is better! And I like your doodles!” he whined and the customer stared between the two of them confusedly.

“Oh fine!” she snapped, not wanting to keep the customer waiting any more. “Just do your job first!”

“No problem!” he winked at her, oozing charm that he then turned towards the customer at full blast.

Reflexively, Alina threw on her apron and washed her hands. Grabbing a 20 oz cup she doodled a crown on it that rested on stylized words that read ‘Prince Asshole.’ She then made him a bone dry cappuccino that was so foamy he’d only be able to eat it with a spoon, just as he liked it.

When she was done she thrusted it at him, doodle front and center. He chuckled at the drawing then handed her a cup in return.

“What’s this?” She asked in confusion as she accepted it.

“Your drink! You didn’t think I’d ask you to make me something for nothing in return did you?”

_Yes._ That was exactly what she had thought. She rotated the cup to see the telltale markings of what was in it, but was greeted with only a crude smiley face. She looked up at Nikolai questioningly.

“It’s a plain coconut milk latte, no foam. Your favorite.” He nodded excitedly at her.

She took a tentative sip. Nikolai was a relatively new employee and Alina was a bit of a coffee snob, but the drink was perfectly balanced and she found herself humming in contentment.

She took another look at the smiley face. It was lopsided, but still a very sweet gesture.

“Thank you,” she said as she returned his giant smile with a small smile of her own.

“Alina, I was wondering- “

She heard the sound of a throat clearing and turned to see the customer from before. “Hey, lovebirds. Can I have my drink now?”

Alina whirled on Nikolai, horrified. “You haven’t made his drink yet?”

He just shrugged and Alina shoved her way around him to the espresso machine to do Nikolai’s job. All the while she apologized loudly to customer while mumbling abuse to Nikolai under her breath.

Once she handed the customer his drink she tore off her apron, not wanting to get stuck behind counter any more. But she wavered for a second before hanging it up, realizing that there was no one else behind the counter with Nikolai.

“Are you alone this shift?” she asked him.

“Aw, are you concerned for me, Little Saint?” he replied, his eyebrow raising in false shock.

Alina seethed at the nickname and gave him a sharp glare.

He gave her a cocky grin in exchange. “Nadia’s working with me, she’s just restocking the back.”

“Oh thank the Saints. For a second there I thought I’d have to waste the entire morning with you!” She proceeded to hang her apron and when she turned around she was surprised by an actual look of hurt in Nikolai’s eyes. She immediately tried to backtrack.

“I didn’t mean it like that! I just meant- that I already have… plans.” Her voice trailed off a bit, not wanting to advertise the fact that she was working two jobs and doing caricatures on the weekend.

His eyes seemed to lighten a bit at that, but his mouth formed a ridiculous pout. “And you didn’t invite meeee?”

“You’re working. Correction, you _should_ be working.”

He paid her no mind as he reached into the day-old basket pulling out two croissants.

“You want theses right?”

She nodded and accepted the croissants. She then wrangled up her coffee and a bag that she had discarded to make Nikolai’s drink. She said good bye, ignoring further pouting from him, and waved as she exited the coffee shop.

_When did Blondie learn my order?_ She wondered as she made her way to the largest park in Os Alta. Sure, he had seen her scarf down countless day-old croissants, but Alina always made her own coffee. He would have had to have been watching her or something.

She blushed a little at the thought, then shook it out of her head. _That’s ridiculous. You’re being ridiculous. Alexei probably just mentioned it or something._

She made her way to her favorite bench under the largest tree in the park. She was glad that it was empty despite her showing up a bit later than usual. _Curse Nikolai._ Claiming it quickly, she set down her coffee and pastries before setting up shop.

She always arranged her bench the same way, lining the back rest with examples of her caricatures and their prices. She did both the slightly terrifying traditional style and the overly cute ‘Chibi’ style that was so popular with the kids these days. Her easel was easy to set up, although a bit wobbly, and she rested her sketch paper along with her favorite drawing pencils on it.

After she was finished with that, she settled onto one side of the bench and pulled out her more expensive sketch book. The paper was designed for mixed media with a good weight to it and slight texture, without it being overkill. She was using oil pastels today, so she pulled their long flat box out of her bag. The box was worn at the edges as she had owned it since her art school days.

She didn’t often use them, but they were nice for when she wanted to work with something that didn’t require much setup while still producing bright and blendable colors. She also pulled out a couple of crumpled Ravkan Brew napkins she had snagged from work. Oil pastels weren’t as messy as paint, but they were messy enough that it was good to have something on hand.

Flipping open the box, she groaned when she saw its contents. A couple of the pastels had broken, but more importantly she had forgotten just how short her white had gotten. It couldn’t be more than 2 cm long and her yellows and oranges weren’t much longer. She suddenly remembered exactly why she hadn’t been using them. _And like an idiot I didn’t bring anything else._

She sighed to herself as she set to work. _I guess I’ll just have to make due. It’s not like I can afford any replacements._

When she was still in school her student loans had covered the cost of her supplies, which was good as their total was almost as much as her tuition. Despite being required, many of the materials were hardly touched, only used for one or two classes. At the time the wasted supplies hadn’t seemed like a big deal to Alina, she figured she could always sell them when she was done, or maybe even use them some day. Besides, she had felt like the time to pay her loans back was eons away, a concern for future her.

She had also once had the promise that her loans would be paid off for her. After graduating she had been given a paid internship to a very prominent greeting card company with the potential that her loans would be covered if they chose to hire her at the end of the year.

It wasn’t exactly what Alina wanted to do with the rest of her life, but it would have been a great way to pay the bills and make some connections. She had thrown herself whole heartedly into the job, taking on every project that came her way, no matter how stupid the concept or contents of the card.

After a rough first two years in art school where her personal style never seemed to be well received Alina had learned to master other’s styles. It often felt cheap to her, but it caused her professors to glow with pride and made her very popular once she had graduated and started work.

But it hadn’t mattered how popular Alina was at work, after a promising first 2 months the company had suddenly gone under. It had something to do with the stock market or e-cards or something. Alina never really learned the reason. All she knew was that she was unexpectedly unemployed and her student loans came tumbling down around her like a landslide.

So here she was, sitting on a park bench, offering to sketch passersby for 4 bucks a head. It didn’t pay as well as either of her other two jobs, but the hours were as flexible as she wanted them to be and she didn’t have to pay taxes on her earnings. Most importantly, it was an opportunity for her to do art, even if it wasn’t her in her own style.

As she worked on her oil pastel drawing, she scouted the people walking by her, trying to trap them with her eyes and beckon them to have her draw them. She was usually able to get at least 4 people an hour when she sat in the heart of the park where the most people walked by.

But as the summer warmth was starting to fade, there were less and less people. This might be Alina’s second to last weekend where she could actually make anything. Soon the weather would drive both her and her customers indoors.

She gazed across the park despairingly until her eyes alighted on a familiar form. For a second she couldn’t quite place him. Who did she know that wore suits? And then the realization that it was _the_ hot customer from yesterday hit her full in the face in the form of a blush.

_Should I call out to him? Wait.  I don’t know his name! Shit. Maybe I should ask him if he wants a caricature. Saints! He’s walking towards me! How would I draw a caricature of him though? He’s too perfect to make fun of! A chibi then? That could work. OMG Alina he isn’t going to want a drawing, he-_

He was standing right in front of her now.

“Hello.” He said to her amicably. He looked a lot less stressed today, _it looks good on him_.

“H-Hi!” She squeaked back.

“I didn’t see you at the coffee shop.” He gestured with a disposable coffee cup in his hand reading ‘Ravkan Brew.’

“What, are you stalking me?” The sarcastic words were out of her mouth before she even realized what she was saying. She was certain that her face was crimson at this point.

His eyebrow quirked, but he continued like she hadn’t said something completely awkward. “You do this often?”

“Fend off stalkers? Yes. Daily, and by the droves.” _Shut up, shut up!_

“No, caricatures in the park.” He chuckled a bit and she felt like she might swoon at any moment.

“Oh. Do you… want one?” She asked nervously, meeting his intense grey eyes.

“Sure. 4 dollars, right?”

She clicked into business mode, shuffling her oil pastel sketch behind her and gesturing him to sit on the bench.

“Yes, 4 dollars, no tax. Traditional or Chibi?”

He sat and looked at some of the examples. Pointing to an old chibi sketch of Mal he asked, “Is this Chibi?”

Alina forced back a giggle. She was used to older people not knowing what a chibi was, but despite his smart suit, the man in front of her didn’t look older than 30. She nodded with restraint.

“That style then.”

“You got it!” Her voice was filled with anxious cheer again. _Why do I sound like that?_

She quickly settled into sketching him, focusing on his suit first, before working her way up to his face, not sure she could handle the eye contact just yet.

It was the perfect chance to ogle him and she might be taking a bit longer than usual sketching him. When she got to his face she had to fight off an unprofessional blush. She suddenly wished she could draw him in _her_ style.

_Wow, his cheekbones are wasted on a chibi drawing. I wonder how hard it would be to mix that shade of grey. Wow, even his nose is hot. Wait, is that weird? Don’t stare at his lips, just draw a simple line. Stop staring. Stop it. Seriously STOP. Just keep drawing!_

The entire time he sat patiently, not speaking. When Alina was done with the drawing she wasn’t sure what to say, so she just showed it to him.

“Is there anything you would like me to change?”

“No, it looks… fine.”

She deflated a bit at the lackluster adjective. _Doesn’t he like it?_ She made to sign her name to the drawing but he interrupted her.

“What were you working on earlier when I walked up?”

Alina’s heart sped up in excitement as she eagerly handed over her sketchbook.

“Just be careful, oil pastels are deceptively messy and well…” She gestured to his fancy black suit.

He accepted the sketchbook confidently. “Don’t worry, I’m familiar with the medium.”

She dropped her jaw a little at that, not expecting the business man to be that knowledgeable about art. Was he an artist himself or just a connoisseur? A hundred questions popped to her mind but he started before her, asking a few questions about the composition and subject matter which she answered readily. She had been drawing one of her Sun Girls which belonged to a collection across multiple mediums of women who seemed to glow and produce light.

After a minute or two, which felt like hours to Alina, he handed the sketchbook without further comment. She had been expecting some sort of compliment or critique after all of his questions, but he didn’t say anything, instead reaching into his suit pocket for his wallet.

Alina tried not to let the disappointment on her face show as she accepted the money. He reached for the chibi drawing but-

“Wait! I haven’t signed it yet.” She said as she picked up a pencil.

She did her usual looping signature, then in a moment of confidence, or desperation, she quickly jotted down her phone number as well.

She practically shoved it at him as she mumbled, “here you go.”

If he saw the phone number he didn’t say anything, although his eyebrows arched slightly. He rose from the bench, but then paused looking down at Alina with a calculating look before he said, “Thank you for showing me your pastel sketch. I liked it…

…a latte.”

He turned quickly on his heel and walked away, leaving Alina gaping at him.

He had returned her coffee pun with _an even worse coffee pun._

She sat on the bench trying to process the entire exchange until another customer approached her. It wasn’t until Alina was walking home that she realized that she still didn’t even know the man’s name and had forgotten to ask him about the 100 dollar tip.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another chapter? In one day? I'm amazed at myself! Having a bit of writers block at the moment though, so I'm not sure when the next chapter will be up. I know what I want to say, but the words are being elusive!
> 
> In the next chapter we will get to see Mal (prick).
> 
> Also wanted to say that in this fic the Darkling will have a similar personality to how he was in S&B before Alina ran away. So stoic and imposing, but with a hint of softer emotion underneath! ;)
> 
> Thanks for reading! I live for comments and kudos! (Seriously though, I LIVE for comments and kudos! Don't be shy!!!) :P Hope you had fun reading and I'll see you next time!


	4. I Don't Need Anything But You

Alina returned home that evening utterly exhausted. She had spent as long as she could in the park trying to get enough commissions to make it worth her time and had then been rained out by an unexpected shower. She had to run home, awkwardly crouched over her bag to protect her supplies from the rain. It had worked, but left her a sopping mess.

On top of that she was _starving_. It was already 4 PM and she hadn’t had anything to eat other than the two croissants gifted to her by Nikolai about 9 hours earlier. She was light headed, cranky, and ready to cut Mikhael, Dubrov, or Mal if they had so much as looked at her leftover Shu food.

She clumsily fell into the entryway and discarded her stuff in a messy heap by the door. Luckily there didn’t seem to be anybody home to block her access to food.

When she opened the door to the refrigerator she practically wept in relief at the sight of her untouched takeout box. Too hungry for utensils she grabbed at a particularly large chunk of congealed noodles and shoved it into her mouth.

“Alina?”

“Mrrrmphhh!” she yelped through a mouthful as she spun around in surprise.

Her roommate/friend/unrequited love stood in the doorway to the kitchen with a smirk on his face.

“And here we see an Alina in her natural habitat! Notice the way she eats her food without utensils to speed up the process.” His voice shifted into the classic nature-documentary narrator cadence as he framed her in his hands like he was videotaping her.

She spluttered and tried not to choke as she swallowed the unchewed mass of noodles. Despite their soft consistency they scraped down her throat uncomfortably. 

“Much like the great anacondas of South America she swallows her prey in one gulp, a feat that is both mesmerizing and disgusting.”

Once the large bolus passed her vocal cords she took the opportunity to yell at him. “Don’t scare me like that! I could have _died_ Mal!”

He shrugged with an infuriating calm. “I know the Heimlich maneuver.”

Her hands were occupied with her takeout so she tried to kick his shin, but he just danced out of the way. He grabbed a fork from the cluttered silverware drawer and presented it to her.

“At least eat with a utensil, madam! How else will you ever find a suitor?”

“Hasn’t seemed to hold you back.” She grumbled as she accepted the utensil.

They settled into an easy conversation talking about Alina’s day and what Mal had gotten up to the night before. At one point Mal reached for a noodle hanging from Alina’s container and she almost stabbed him with her fork.

It was times like this, when it was just the two of them, that Alina could almost forget the growing distance between them or the unintentional things Mal did to hurt her. The endless parade of women, the days of her one sided attempts at conversation, the way he let his friends mock her.

Once she had finished her dinner she deposited her container in the trash and went to wash her fork in the sink. She felt a sudden warmth along her back as Mal stood directly behind her. He reached over her head into the cabinet above her to grab something and when he brought it down he let his arms surround her in a loose hug. She stiffened at the gesture until she realized what he was holding in front of her face.

“You want to watch it?” he asked conspiratorially, waving a bag of microwave popcorn at her.

Rolling her eyes, she finished rinsing off her spoon and deposited it in the drying rack.

“That depends. 1982, 1999, or 2014?”

She turned around to face him which left only a few inches between the two of them. Her breath caught in her throat when she realized how close they were. It took everything in her not to rise on her toes and meet him in a kiss.

Seeming to finally notice the extent of their proximity he let his arms fall as he took a step back, casual as always. “2014? But I could be convinced.”

Alina tried not to let disappointment at his distance fall on her face.

“You aren’t going out tonight?” Her voice was soft and she looked at her socked feet on the ratty kitchen linoleum to avoid his gaze.

“Nah, my plans with Zoya fell through again.”

“Oh, yeah?” she asked with false nonchalance and looked up now to examine his expression.

Alina hated Zoya, a fact that she had made very clear to Mal. She usually avoided commenting on his many flings, but this one was absolutely insufferable. She walked around like she owned the world and everyone in it. She had kicked Alina out of not only the living room (to make out with Mal), but the kitchen (to make out with Mal), the bathroom (to reapply her lipstick after making out with Mal), and even the hallway (to get to Mal’s room faster to, _guess what_ , make out with Mal).

The worst thing about it was that she was the only girl who seemed to comeback. She constantly tore through Mal’s life like a tornado leaving nothing but devastation in her wake. It seemed like Mal only existed in two states: enraptured with Zoya or trying to forget her via ladies or late night drinking with Mikhael and Dubrov.

“Yeah, I really thought it would work this time.”

It was only the look on his face, like a kicked puppy, that prevented Alina from whacking him over the head with a metaphorical sign that read “REALY?!?!” Mal and Zoya had been off and on for over a year now and it was obvious to everyone, except Mal, that they would never make it for longer than a month at a time. But she restrained herself from commenting and instead said, “Okay, let me find the DVD.”

“2014?” he clarified.

“Yeah, yeah, just no throwing popcorn at the TV this time! We have an ant problem as is without you feeding them.”

She had a false smile on her face that fell away when she entered the hallway. She hated Zoya and the way she treated Mal, but more than that she hated how easily Mal’s heart broke over her.

It took some time to track down the DVD and even more time to set up the archaic TV system, but she accomplished it in the end with a fair amount of swearing. Mal brought in a giant bowl of half-burnt popcorn and they settled into their sagging couch.

The thumping beat of the overture came on quickly followed by the almost familiar refrain of “it’s a hard knock life” that had been auto-tuned all the way to the 9th level of hell and back. The pair groaned and Mal threw some popcorn at the TV.

“Mal!”

“I’m sorry! I can’t help myself when the auto-tuning somehow gets worse every time!”

“At least throw the burnt stuff if you have to!”

It was ridiculous and cliché, but the two foster kids found themselves drawn to the Annie musicals when things felt grey or lonely. They loved mocking the movies, screeching along with the songs, and saying the lines by heart seconds before the actors did. They found it embarrassing and never told anyone else about their secret affection for the little orphan’s story. Others wouldn’t understand anyways.

Mal preferred the 2014 version because he loved to yell “FOSTER KID” at the top of his lungs whenever Annie corrected people for calling her an orphan. Alina preferred the 1982 version because she found Carol Burnett’s Miss Hannigan to be the cornerstone of dark comedy. They both found the Annie in the 1999 version to be slightly unsettling so they tended to avoid it, but would still watch it on occasion.

Neither of them had ever been lucky enough to be adopted, let alone into a Daddy Warbucks situation, so they always liked to boo and hiss at the unrealistically, saccharine ending. They had both had a slew of foster parents, some bad and some good with a couple of overlaps between them. Those were the best times for Alina, when she and Mal got to share a home for whatever uncertain length of time.

As they sat on the couch together, shoulders casually touching, Alina felt her heart warm. She could almost forget that she was Mal’s second choice for the evening. They laughed and yelled and generally behaved liked they were 8 years old again and Alina wanted to stop time in that moment.

“It boggles my mind why they would pick a Shiba Inu to play Sandy the mutt. No Alina! I don’t care what IMBD says. That dog is a pure bred Shiba Inu, not a Golden-Chow Mix!”

 _Okay maybe not that moment._ She thought to herself.

But their time together was cut short when Mal got a text. He opened his phone, accidentally flashing Alina with the make-up sext Zoya had just sent him. _Ugh, even her lingerie is snooty._

He bolted up to get ready to leave and was out the door with little more than a “Gotta go!” and a “Don’t wait up.”

The door slammed behind him causing the old house to shake, leaving Alina alone on the sagging couch surrounded by the choruses of “I don’t need anything but you.” The irony was not lost on her. She got up to turn off the TV, not caring that the movie wasn’t completely over yet.

Ignoring the popcorn littered across the floor she headed straight to bed. As she changed into her oversized sleep shirt she couldn’t help but notice how pathetic her worn Fruit of the Loom underwear was.

_Maybe if I had matching lingerie like her…_

She settled into her bed after making sure to set her alarm for another day of caricatures.

_…No. Probably not even then._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh Alina, hopefully the sun will come out tomorrow! 
> 
> Too much? lol The Annie references were actually pretty last minute but I kind of thought it fit. Like the two of them were trying to reclaim or celebrate their identity while also trying to use jokes to cover up how much they both wanted to be adopted. ^^; I hope you guys liked it!
> 
> I'm not sure when the next chapter will be up. I'm currently in the process of moving so I won't have internet to post, but I'll still be writing!
> 
> As always, I live for comments and kudos! They keep me motivated and let me know that you are enjoying the series as much as me!!
> 
> Until next time!


	5. Tinder Date from Hell

The next few days that passed were unremarkable for Alina. Mal was back together with Zoya for the twelfth time, not that Alina was counting. And she continued on with her normal life, working, eating, sleeping, checking her phone every few minutes to see if the mysterious business man had texted her.

He hadn’t.

Alina let out a long sigh as she leaned against the counter. It was a slow day at the Ravkan Brew and she just wanted to get home so that she could wallow in peace. She wasn’t scheduled to work at the boutique that evening so she hoped to work on some art, maybe organize her portfolio. Although it would probably be more productive to organize her sock drawer.

“What’s wrong, Little Saint?”

“Alexei, I will not hesitate to hit you if you keep calling me that!” He had a knowing smirk on his face that Alina wanted nothing more than to smack off.

A customer came up to the counter and Alexei saw to him, allowing Alina to continue her moping. After he was finished he took a long look at Alina.

“I think it’s time.” Alexei said seriously and he grabbed Alina by the shoulders.

_This can’t be good._

“Time for what?” She asked hesitantly. Alexei’s ideas were rarely beneficial for Alina. There was a small hole in her kitchen ceiling, a rip in the seat of her favorite jeans, and the persistent remains of a chocolate muffin caked into the seams of her backpack to prove it. There were also a multitude invisible scars in the form of embarrassing memories that made Alina cringe whenever she thought of them.

“For a Tinder date!”

“No.”

“Pleeaasee?” He whined.

“Absolutely not.”

“But-”

“NO!”

“If you would just-“

“Saints, Alexei! Would you just quit it already?” She snapped irritably and shook him off.

Alexei’s face fell and Alina immediately felt bad. She knew that it wasn’t his fault that her love life sucked and that he just wanted to help. His meddling might be annoying, but it came from a place of friendship.

Annoying, overbearing, shit-talking friendship. But a true friendship none the less.

After a long sigh, she softened her tone. “I’m sorry, Alexei. I just…” She trailed off, not sure how to explain the depths of how pathetic she was.

“Mal’s back with Zoya isn’t he?”

She stared across the counter to the door, wishing that a customer would come in to free her from the conversation.

“Yeah.”

It wasn’t the whole truth. In reality she was pissy because Mal had not only gotten back together with Zoya, he had also unceremoniously dropped her to do so.

‘Annie Nights’ used to be sacred for the two of them. They would stop whatever they were doing if one of them needed it. And they would take as long as needed to cheer each other up, even if it involved watching all three movies multiple times. But, it seemed like that wasn’t important to Mal anymore. It seemed like Alina was the only one who cared.

It also didn’t help that the hot customer hadn’t texted her. Alina couldn’t help but feel the sharp sting of rejection whenever she looked at her old, blank phone.

Alexei grabbed her shoulders again, fervently. “That’s exactly why we need to get you out there. You know what they say. ‘ _The best way to get over one man is to get under another!’_ ”

She stared pointedly at his hands gripping her and he dropped them hastily, not wanting to incite violence in her.

“Umm, isn’t that more of a cautionary expression than a truth?”

He looked at her gravely, putting his hand to his heart. “It’s the only truth I know.”

He sobered again. “Seriously though, Alina. Enough is enough! Just go on one date. _One!_ And I won’t bother you about it for a week.”

She weighed the options seriously as she wiped down the already clean espresso machine. It had a little sticky note on it that read ‘You look brew-tiful today!’ in Nikolai’s large, looping cursive.

“Make it a month,” she finally conceded.

“Eeeeee!” he squealed loudly, drawing the attention of a couple of customers. Ignoring her personal space completely, he dug her ancient phone out of her pocket to boot up the Tinder app. Alina squawked angrily at him. He just waved her off.

A customer entered, but Alexei didn’t even look up. She pinched his arm, hard, before plastering on her best ‘what-can-I-get-for-you’ smile for the customer.

By the time she was finished Alexei had already swiped right on a couple of options and had a couple of messages to show her.

“Look Alina, you’re so popular!” He exclaimed, shoving the phone in her face.

Alina rolled her eyes. “I’m sure it’s like this for everyone.”

Alexie shot her a despairing look as she looked over her options.

_Pass. Way too scary. Meh. Ehhh. Blah. Kinda cute, seems interesting enough. Just no. Sociopath with a lock on his basement door. Hot douchebag. Cute but probably younger than he says he is…_

“Sooo??” He asked her.

“This one, I guess.” She pointed to the guy that she had categorized as ‘kinda cute, seems interesting enough.’

The man was a few years older than Alina with a weak chin and heavy lidded eyes. But his smile was cute in an awkward kind of way and he was well traveled. Alina had always wanted to travel, but had never been out of Ravka. She thought it might make for some interesting conversation.

“Interesting choice.” Alexei snatched back the phone sending a flurry of messages to the Tinder match. Before Alina could protest, Alexei had set up a date for her that evening at a popular nightclub.

“He’ll meet you at 9 in front of Dagrenner,” he said, handing the phone back to Alina.

She accepted it resignedly. “And you’ll stop pestering me for a month?”

“I make no promises.”

She wacked him on the arm.

“Ow! Why must you be so violent?”

****

With 10 minutes until 9, Alina found herself outside of Dagrenner, one of the more popular nightclubs in Os Alta. She had left her house feeling like there was a distinct imbalance between the large amount of makeup on her face and the tiny amount of clothes on her body. Alexei, being the meddling troll he was, had told Genya about her date. She had rushed over with two large duffle bags, one full of clothes, the other full of makeup. The result of which had left Alina looking like a completely different person.

It wasn’t that the make up or the clothes were bad. They were in fact flawless. It just wasn’t her. She was sporting a truckload of foundation to make her skin ‘effortlessly’ beautiful, a dramatic smoky eye, a skin tight mini skirt, and a pair of very ill-advised heels, all loaned by Genya. The only thing on her body that was hers was her top. It was a metallic blue tank that shifted colors in the light. Slinky and tight, it hugged her every curve, or lack thereof. She had bought it in a fit of confidence after she had gotten the greeting card internship. That was over a year ago and it was her first time wearing it.

Awkwardly standing in line with the other club-goers, Alina worried that she wouldn’t be able to get into the club. She may look like the others in line, but she lacked any of their carefree, self-assured presence. She was certain that the bouncer would take one look at her and kick her out of the line.

After about 15 minutes standing, Alina was almost to the bouncer. Her date was already 5 minutes late and she was on the verge of bailing before she had to pay the ridiculously expensive cover charge that she had learned about halfway into the line. Before she could escape, she heard her named being called.

A pompous looking man in blue polo shirt and pressed pair of khakis came striding up to her. Alina squinted at him. The Tinder profile pictures on her old phone had been blurry and poor quality, but she hadn’t remembered her match looking so… preppy. He even had a cream cardigan slung over his shoulders.

He stopped about one step too close to her and proceeded to look her up and down like a piece of meat. It was so textbook douchey that she had to fight back a bitter laugh.

“You’re skinnier than you looked in your pics, but you’ll do.” He said with a slight sneer.

 _And you’re bougey-er than you looked in your pics,_ she wanted to retort, but before she could he was dragging her along past the bouncers. They gave her date a curt nod as they strode past without paying the cover fee. As the doors opened they were blasted with a wave of heat and noise. The low pitched beat that had been faintly audible from the line was now thudding through Alina’s bones, making her teeth rattle.

“You should have told me you were going to wear blue!” He yelled over his shoulder.

“Why?” She yelled backed, but she wasn’t even sure she could hear herself.

Her date dragged her past the main throng of people and pulled her up to thick metal door. He put his sleepy-eyed face up to her ear and shouted. “Because we are too matchy-matchy now. It’s embarrassing.”

_Um, what?_

He opened the door to reveal a private room.

_Nope._

Alina pulled against his hand, but he shoved her awkwardly into the room. The door swung shut behind them and the din of the club ominously lowered to a murmur.

 _Saints. I’m about to die._ She panicked as she backed away from the man. _And it’s going to be all Alexei’s fault!_

He looked at her pityingly. “Look, I’m not going to kill you, I just wanted a quiet place to talk.”

“I’m sure that’s what you tell all of your victims.” Alina deadpanned as she looked around the room for a weapon. _If I get out of here alive the first thing I’m going to do is kill Alexei._

“Ha! You’re funny!” He smiled, but the expression did nothing to put her at ease. “I’m Vasily as I’m sure you know.”

She just nodded. _At least his name matches his profile._

“Due to my increased prominence in the community, I like to set up a few ground rules for my dates, or company in general.”

_What?_

He proceeded to layout an extensive code of conduct involving mannerisms, language, and permitted fraternization. He ended his little speech with a crazed smile that Alina suspected was supposed to be his best ‘charming’ look.

“Are we clear?”

_What in the actual living-_

“Good!” He exclaimed in her silence and started to drag her out of the room.

The sudden blast of noise mixed with her utter confusion over the current situation left Alina pliant to Vasily’s tugging. Weaving with surprising ease through the crowd he brought her to the bar. Dazedly she climbed onto the barstool next to his. He quickly ordered some type of cocktail for the both of them.

Alina made sure to watch the bartender’s hands closely as he prepared the drink. _Do all Tinder dates go like this?_ She wondered to herself.

“So, your profile said that you’re an artist.” Vasily asked with a bored expression on his face. “What galleries have you been featured in?”

“Oh, um- none.” She confessed, wishing she had inspected the profile Alexei had made for her a bit closer.

Not seeming to hear or, or not caring what her response was he continued. “I feel like I’m always visiting some gallery or another for my blasted work functions. It’s such a drag. And so many of the exhibits are modern trash. I mean, who actually cares about art unless it’s obviously expensive. Did you hear about that one servant who threw away thousands of dollars of modern art?”

Alina’s eyes widened at the word ‘servant.’ _Who even uses that word anymore?_

Vasily seemed to take her shocked look as interest and continued his story. “Right? She threw it away with the rest of the garbage. What an idiot. She was in a modern art gallery; she should have known better. They didn’t even fire her! That exhibit probably cost more than her yearly salary. But I guess, in the end it was just that though, _garbage_.” He sneered.

Their drinks showed up and they both paused to try them. Alina almost spit out her first sip. The concoction was absolutely vile, bright red with an assortment of candied fruit sitting in the bottom of the glass and decorating the rim. She had no idea what it was supposed to taste like past sugar and rubbing alcohol. Vasily downed half of his in one gulp.

“Isn’t that the point of modern art though? To get people talking and make them feel something, even if it’s anger?” She asked him coolly.

“Oh Saints, you’re one of them aren’t you?”

“No, I just-“

“Don’t tell me. You just did an exhibit on menstrual blood right? Or a macramé series using cat vomit. Or something equally disgusting. No wonder you’re so skinny! Maybe if you made something people actually liked you’d be able to afford something to eat. Ha! I’ll tell you wha-“

It was at that point that Alina threw her almost untouched drink at him. He was hit in the face with a splash of the vile red liquid, followed quickly by the slap of candied fruit chunks. Alina couldn’t help herself.

She wished she had done it sooner.

 _Next up is Alexi with one of those extra hot mochas he likes so much_ , she thought as she flounced away from her sopping date. Pushing through the dance floor roughly, she ignored the complaints of the the other clubbers and the derogatory comments Vasily flung after her. The glowing green of the exit sign guided her like the North Star and she quickly found herself in the blissful coolness of a back alley.

She leaned up against the slick bricks of the nightclub, not caring if the grim rubbed off on her shirt. A shaky exhalation rocked through her and she fought back tears. Pressing the palms of her hands to her eyes, she wondered again if this was what all dating was like.

She wished Mal was there. She wished they were dating so that she wouldn’t have to go through this to begin with. She wished his arms would wrap around her as he carried her home. She wished-

“Alina?”

An all too familiar voice interrupted the relative quiet of the alley.

“Go away, Nikolai.” She groaned and continued to cover her eyes like a child who hadn’t developed object permanence yet. _If I can’t see him, he can’t see me._

“What happened, Alina? Do I need to go beat somebody up? Just let me know and I’ll go get a baseball bat. I’d punch them out, but I wouldn’t want to break a nail.”

She let out a tear-choked laugh.

“Nail care is not a laughing matter, young lady!”

Alina let her hands down a bit to wipe at tears. She looked at them expecting the tell-tale smudge of mascara, but was surprised to find them clean. _Genya thinks of everything._

He took a step closer and moved to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. “There you are,” he exclaimed softly. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” she sighed as she moved her face away from his hand, not meeting his hazel eyes.

“Are you sure? I wasn’t kidding about the bat, you know.”

Before she could respond the back door of the club was thrown open and one of the bouncers came barreling out. “YOU!” He raised an accusatory finger at her as he approached.

Nikolai quickly stepped in between them. “My fine sir! Whatever could be the problem?”

“This bitch left before paying!”

Alina popped her head over Nikolai’s shoulder. “Paying for what?!”

“The thirty dollars for the cover and the twenty dollars for your drink.”

She swallowed, hard. Vasily had obviously decided not to pay for her part of the bill.

Alina exclaimed, “That drink was twenty dollars?” at the same time Nikolai exclaimed, “The cover charge is thirty dollars?”

Frantically Alina whispered into Nikolai’s ear. “I currently only have forty-five dollars to my name and we don’t get paid until Saturday!”

“Don’t worry Little Saint, I got you.”

“Nikolai, I can’t let you do that.”

The bouncer took another menacing step forward. “Hey, somebody’s got to pay or I’m calling the cops!”

Nikolai shot a pleading look at Alina. “Just let me do this for you. Please?”

“I… okay.” She finally caved.

He reached for his wallet immediately, pulling out a crisp fifty dollar bill. The bouncer snatched it from his hand and left without another word.

“I promise that I’ll pay you back as soon as I can.” Alina said as she kicked at a rock on the ground dejectedly.

“Really, Alina, don’t worry about it. I live with my parents, so it’s not a big deal.”

She continued to roll the rock with her foot and Nikolai sighed.

“How about you pay me back over time? Ten dollars a week for five weeks?” He asked softly.

“That sounds good.” Alina smiled weakly.

“Now!” He clapped his hands together then pointed them at her. “How are you getting home?”

She glanced at the time on her phone. “Well it’s 9:46 now, so I’ll just catch the next bus in 24 minutes.”

“Why don’t you let me give you a ride home?”

That was the last thing Alina wanted. It had taken her months before she finally let Alexi or Genya visit the house and even longer before she felt comfortable having them over. It wasn’t that she was ashamed of her house, it was that she could tell people pitied her living situation. She saw the look that every new person had when they crossed the threshold into the narrow living room; eyes tight with concern and mouth drawn into a thin line to hold in judgement. And she hardly even knew Nikolai. She didn’t think he would be the type to gossip about her tax bracket, but she still wasn’t sure.

“C’mon, Alina. It’s already getting cold and I can see the goosebumps forming on your arms. Don’t get me wrong, scaly skin can be quite attractive, but it would probably only look good if you dyed your skin green first.”

He was right, Alina was already shivering and they had only been outside for a few minutes. She was tired, humiliated, and ready to be home an hour ago.

“Oh, okay.” She figured that she could get him to drop her off a few houses down at least.

“Perfect!” He exclaimed. A wide, charming smile broke across his face and Alina couldn’t help but compare it to Vasily’s awful smile earlier. He led her down the alley and across the street until they stopped in front of a motorcycle. It had a vanity license plate that read ‘VLKVN.’

He handed her a helmet.

_Oh no. Saints, no._

“Here, take my jacket too.” He handed her his soft leather jacket revealing a thin t-shirt.

“One, I’m not getting on that deathtrap. And two, you aren’t going to look good with scales either. You’ll freeze in that shirt!”

“I look good in, _and out_ , of anything,” he gave her a cocky wink. “But if my scales displease you, we better move quickly.

“What does ‘volk-vin’ stand for?” She stalled.

“Ah, Volkvolny?” He patted the seat of the motorcycle fondly. “That’s my baby girl’s name.”

“Shouldn’t it be V-L-K-V-L-N-Y then?”

A very mournful look overcame his face. “They only gave me 5 letters.”

“Then why not pick a different name?”

“I didn’t pick it.” He said cheerfully as he strapped a helmet to his head.

“Who did?”

Nikolai looked Alina dead in the eye and patted the motorcycle again. “She did.”

Alina gaped at him and he quickly took back her helmet then worked to strap it on to her.

“Now let’s go, Little Saint!”

_I’m going to die._

_And then I’m going to come back to haunt Nikolai._

_And Alexi._

_And Mal._

_And maybe Genya, when I get bored of the guys._

_Oh, and the hot businessman. Wouldn’t want to leave anybody out._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I say this at the end of every chapter, but I had so much fun writing this chapter! Did I make Vasily douchey enough? lol Alexei better watch out for hot, flying liquids for the next few days!!
> 
> I can't wait to write the next chapter! A lot more Nikolina is coming your way! Oh and Mal. Very shit Mal. :D
> 
> Anyways! I hope you enjoyed reading. I live for comments and kudos! (Seriously though, I check my phone for them about as often as Alina checks to see if the Darkling has texted her! haha)
> 
> Until next time! (^-^)"/"


	6. Brownies and Kvas

Alina gripped tightly to Nikolai, her fingers bunching in his t-shirt. She had a new appreciation for the expression ‘flying by the seat of your pants.’ She had never been on a motorcycle before and she was getting a crash course on how terrifying it could be.

 _Well, hopefully not a_ crash _course._ She thought as she involuntarily pulled herself tighter to his back. She let one cheek rest against him as she shut her eyes. She could still make out the streetlights as they whooshed past so she clenched them tighter.

“You okay back there?” Nikolai shouted back to her.

Her fingers tightened again, but she managed to croak out a weak “yes.”

He let out a deep, whooping laugh that Alina could feel through his back.

_At least one of us isn’t scared Saintless._

The night air whipped through Alina’s hair and pressed itself against her skin. She was glad for the warm leather jacket Nikolai had loaned her, but felt very awkward wearing it. It smelled faintly of coffee and coconut. And as she clung to him she realized that it of course smelled like him.

Alina had no idea how she had gotten herself into this situation. Not only was she on the back of a relatively strange man’s motorcycle, wearing his clothes, they were also headed to her house. She knew that Nikolai had a way of talking circles around Alina. He could convince her to let him change his work schedule or have extra breaks or make him ‘just one more’ dry cappuccino, but this was a new level of ridiculous.

They rounded a corner and she gripped to him tighter.

“Alina, I’m not usually one to complain and I do enjoy lovely ladies such as yourself clinging to me. But I also rather like my lower half and you seem to be cutting off my circulation at this point.”

“You constantly complain!” Her voice came out tight and snappish with fear.

He chuckled softly at her. “I guess that’s true.”

Suddenly she could feel her butt lift from the seat of the motorcycle as they crested a speed bump. Her hands scrabbled at Nikolai’s chest desperately and she let out a yelp.

“Ow! Alina, it was just a speed bump. Are you sure you’re okay? If you’re too scared I could slow down or something.”

She desperately wanted to say yes, but before the word could leave her mouth she was overwhelmed with frustration. So much of her life revolved around her being scared or helpless. And what did it get her? A terrible date with a sleepy eyed asshole? A best friend that didn’t even know she existed? Two part-time jobs that were slowly killing her artistic dreams?

If she could do this, could conquer her current fear, then maybe she could actually do something with her life instead of letting it pass her by.

“No! I’m fine. I can do this!” She said with a surprisingly steady voice.

Her hands loosened their death-like grip and she let them slide to Nikolai’s hips. Then she slowly pulled away from his back. They hit another bump on the road and she almost lost her cool again, her hands griping his hips tight enough to bruise.

But she didn’t let herself think anymore.

Instead she let him go.

Her hands hovered at his sides as she found her own balance without him. And finally she opened her eyes. The view of the night rushing past her was astounding and she laughed in delight.

“Never doubted you!” Nikolai praised her warmly.

The moment was magical, _Alina_ felt magical. It was almost as if she could feel the prickle of starlight as they flew through the night. Her laughter turned into a deep whoop that mimicked Nikolai’s earlier noise.

“Ah, Alina? I hate to interrupt,” Nikolai’s voice broke through her glee and the bike started to slow. Her balance shifted and she grabbed at his hips again. “But, I need to know where to go.”

She quickly instructed him on what street to take and in a matter of minutes found themselves on her block. Once they were a few houses away, Alina told him to stop in the hopes that he would mistake one of the nicer homes as her own. She dismounted ungracefully, feeling equal parts relieved and disappointed that the ride was over.

“Thanks for the ride.” She worked at the straps of her helmet.

“Yeah, no problem! I-” Nikolai was interrupted by a comically loud growl emanating from his stomach. He looked up her with a sheepish grin and it was the closest thing to embarrassment she had ever seen on his face.

“Let’s get you something to eat.” Alina said with a roll to her eyes. The words surprised her, but they also felt right. “Come in and I’ll try and find something for you to eat.”

Nikolai also seemed surprised at her words and he scrambled off of his bike quickly, rushing before she changed her mind. He gave an excited “okay!” as he removed his helmet and set it on the bike.

_Oh no. What have I done?_

He started to bound up the path to the house that they had stopped in front of. She cringed. “Ah, Nikolai?”

“Yeah?”

“That’s not my house…”

He started to move back in the direction of the bike, obviously thinking her house was across the street.

“Uh, not that one either…”

He gave her a puzzled look. “Then wh-“

“Look, there’s no way around it, my house is a dump and I don’t usually like to show it to people. But, I want to thank you by getting you some food, so I’m making an exception. The only other people who have been over are Alexei and Genya. But, I mean- It’s not like I’m embarrassed or anything! I just- People have this face when they see the house and, well, don’t say I didn’t warn you.” The words came out in an anxious rush and Alina could feel her cheeks warm despite the nighttime air.

“Alina, I’m not going to judge you on your house. Unless of course you have your gothic gargoyles placed next to your romantic cherub statutes. That clash of eras would just be unacceptable!”

She shot him an exasperated look, but led the way to her house anyways. She tried not to see her house through his eyes. Every familiar flaw seemed to flash like a neon sign that read “POOR FOSTER KID” and Alina had to fight down the urge to turn around and flee.

Nikolai's face remained impassive. If he noticed the sagging roof, cracked windows, or ivy slowly consuming the house he didn’t show it. Alina felt a small spark of gratefulness for him.

As they reached the lawn, she saw that the living room lights were on. Mal was home.

 _Ah well, here we go._ She braced herself as she unlocked the front door.

Stepping into the living room she was immediately greeted with the sight of a full blown make out session. Zoya in all of her glorious, dark-haired beauty was straddling Mal as he sat on the couch. She tried to ignore the hot sting of jealousy in her chest.

_At least they are clothed… this time._

The two of them fell apart slightly in shock.

“What the… Alina? I thought you were asleep.” Mal’s brow furled in confusion. He looked her up and down, taking in her appearance. It reminded her of the way Vasily had looked at her earlier and she grimaced internally.

“I did text you,” she groused as she kicked off her shoes. _But you were obviously too busy to notice._

Mal still looked confused, but Zoya just looked bored out of her mind. Then Nikolai passed through the doorway into sight. Mal sat up straighter, almost knocking Zoya off of his lap and her expression changed from ‘are you done talking to Alina yet’ to ‘why _hello_ there!’

“Hi, I’m Nikolai,” he introduced himself cheerily, tactfully ignoring the obvious heavy petting that had just been interrupted. “I work with Alina!”

“And you brought him home?” Mal asked incredulously.

“Yeah, how did you pull that off Starkov?” Zoya directed the snide comment towards her before winking seductively at Nikolai.

Alina fought back a gagging noise. Before she could reply, Mal started again in an angry tone.

“And just what are you wearing?” He waved a free hand at her outfit in distaste. “Don’t you have any respect for yourself?”

Taken aback Alina’s eyes widened. Sure Mal liked to play the field, but despite the number of women he had brought back to his bed, she had never heard him shame them. He was actually quite the gentleman and would even give Mikhael or Dubrov the occasional smack upside the head if they said something particularly sexist. His scornful critique of her outfit left her blindsided and completely speechless. So she just stared pointedly at Zoya who was wearing even less clothes than herself.

“And where is your respect?” Nikolai jumped in protectively and pointed to Mal.

“How dare you belittle a woman like that. Alina can wear whatever clothes she wants.” Nikolai paused and a cheeky smile crossed is face as he side-eyed Alina. “Well, I might advise against full exposure, that would just be a traffic hazard! You could probably get a hundred people killed if you chose the right intersection, Alina.”

His face sobered again and he turned his attention back to Mal. “A woman’s clothing or lack thereof isn’t an invitation, or a gauge of self-respect, or really anything except just that, clothing!”

Mal’s face turned eight shades of red. “Don’t tell me how to talk to Alina in my own home, asshole.” He looked like he was about to jump up and punch Nikolai.

There were a lot of reasons to punch Nikolai, Saints knew Alina had a running list of her own, but this wasn’t one of them. She finally found her voice and placed herself between them. “Nikolai and I were just going to the kitchen to get some food, okay?” She glared at Mal. “We’ll talk about… _whatever this is_ later.”

Zoya’s eyes had narrowed and she was glancing between the three of them with a calculating look. Her mouth was pursed like she had just tasted a particularly sour lemon, or like she had accidentally drunk tap water instead of the sparkling stuff she carried around in fancy glass water bottles.

“I’m bored of this.” She sighed. “Let’s go to my place, Mal.” She slid off his lap and tugged at his wrist. Mal didn’t budge, instead continuing to stare angrily at Nikolai. She leaned down to kiss him. “We have unfinished business, don’t we?”

His attention was finally distracted enough and he let Zoya lead him out the door. Once it snapped shut behind them Alina let out a breath that she didn’t know she had been holding.

“Wow, he’s a real charmer. I can see what you see in him.” Nikolai deadpanned at Alina.

“I’ve never seen him like that before.” Alina avoided Nikolai’s eyes then tried to change the conversation. “Do you want food or not?”

He stared at her for another moment until he decided to let it go. “To the kitchen! Onwards!”

She led him into the dingy kitchen and gestured for him to take a seat at the rickety dining table. It soon became apparent that they would have to change their plans. The fridge was almost completely barren containing only a few eggs, sauce packets from the Shu restaurant, a banana, and thin layer of expired milk in a gallon jug. Alina nervously moved to the cabinets to see what they held, but was equally disappointed. They had some odds and ends, but nothing that could easily be made into actual food.

She turned to face Nikolai, “Um, I don’t think we actually have anything to eat.”

“Could I look?”

“Sure, knock yourself out.” She moved away from the cabinets to give him some room. After a few moments of rifling and rooting around he finally produced a brownie mix from the depths of the cabinet.

“How about this?”

She took it from him and checked the expiration date. Despite the layer of dust that had collected on the top of the box it was surprisingly still good by a few months. She double checked the needed ingredients. _Eggs- yes, water- duh, oil- wait …ah there we go!_

“I think this could actually work!” She grinned at him excitedly.

“Okay, what do we do next?”

“Wait, have you never made a brownie mix before?”

He looked at her again with his almost sheepish smile. “The uh… I mean my mom doesn’t really let me in the kitchen.”

A fair amount of teasing ensued as Nikolai and Alina set to work. Multiple accidents and missteps occurred, the worst of which resulted in an oil spill that Nikolai pretended to slip in, but then actually slipped in two seconds later.

At some point during the endeavor Alina got brownie batter on Nikolai’s jacket, she had long forgotten that she was wearing it at all. Wiping at the affected area, she apologized profusely. When she offered the jacket back to Nikolai he waved her off. The old house tended to run chilly so she kept it on.

They continued their efforts and what should have been the work of a few minutes spread into a full hour, but Alina couldn’t remember the last time she had so much fun. Her cheeks ached and her stomach was sore from laughter.

They put the brownie pan in the oven. “Are you sure this thing isn’t going to explode?” Nikolai asked warily as he looked at the ancient oven. “It hasn’t so far,” was all Alina had to say. The kitchen was completely wrecked so they set to work cleaning it up.

It seemed like they had spent another hour just cleaning up their mess, but by the time they were done there was still 15 minutes left on the timer. They looked at each other awkwardly, not sure what to do.

“Can I see your room?” Nikolai blurted out.

“How incredibly forward of you Mr…” Alina paused mid bit, forgetting his last name. “Wait, I should know this, I write it on the shift board every week… ah! Mr. Sturmhond!”

He almost seemed to blush.

“Aw, what the heck! Come on.” Her room was the best part of the house after all.

She also had something new to show off after recently finding a few strands of white fairy lights sticking out of a dumpster. She had cleaned them off thoroughly and found that only a few of the bulbs were out. So she carefully wrapped them around her bed frame and lined the walls with them. They twinkled gently giving the room a gentle glow.

“Saints, I must have forgotten to turn them off before I left,” she mumbled to herself as she tried to calculate the added expense to the electric bill that month. She unplugged them and turned on the overhead light, but not before Nikolai gave a low whistle of appreciation. “Wow, Little Saint, this is really something.”

Alina glared at him expecting sarcasm, but to her surprise his face only held awe. He stepped into the room almost reverently and took in his surroundings. “Is this all your art?”

“Oh, um… yeah. Do you like it?”

“Alina, this is amazing!” He stepped closer to one of her favorite drawings and inspected it.

“Do you want to see more?”

He nodded enthusiastically.

Slightly embarrassed, but also elated at the praise, she dug out her portfolio from behind her dresser. The bed was the only space with room for the both of them so she clambered on to it, thankful that she had remembered to make her bed that morning.

Nikolai hesitated for a moment until she patted the spot next to her. He bounded over and hopped up causing the bed to creak ominously. “Careful!”

“Sorry,” he apologized but didn’t look all that remorseful as he tugged the portfolio towards him.

He asked her all sorts of questions about her art and heaped praise upon praise over it. After a while he asked her why she didn’t do it professionally. Alina usually dreaded this question, but for once she launched into the story of her failed internship with only mild discomfort. He nodded along sympathetically as he continued to flip through her work.

“-and that’s how I ended up at the Ravkan Brew. Oh, and I work a second job at a makeup boutique.”

“And?” He looked at her expectedly.

“And what? That’s the end.”

“But what are you going to do next?”

Alina had no idea what to say. She had always been so defeated over the whole event that she hadn’t really thought about what to do next. The weight of her student loans had always seemed like an insurmountable barrier to her dreams. But now she wasn’t so certain. It was the kind of night where anything seemed possible.

Her thoughts were interrupted by the egg timer they had brought into the bedroom with them. The oven was so old that it didn’t even have its own timer. She shot up from the bed. “The brownies!”

Alina grabbed the oven mitts and Nikolai opened the oven door. They were greeted with an unfortunate waft of acrid smoke. The edges of the brownies were blackened. Alina swore.

“Maybe the middle will still be good,” Nikolai said hopefully.

However, that small hope was soon dashed as the motion of taking the brownies out caused the center slosh around. Somehow the old oven had managed to burn the edges while leaving the center uncooked. Alina set it on top of the oven angrily.

They stared at the failed creation and Nikolai’s stomach growled again. Alina sighed then reached into a cabinet high about the fridge. “The only way we are going to be able to get this down is if we have some help.” She pulled a large bottle of kvas down.

“Are you sure?” He stared at her doubtfully.

She procured a pair of shot glasses. “What, scared you can’t keep up?”

Alina cocked an eyebrow at him.

He snatched the glasses from her. “Of course not! It’s you I’m worried about… Little Saint.”

She squawked her indignation at the nickname.

The rest of the evening became a blur for the both of them. They devoured the brownies straight from the pan using forks. Both of them burnt their tongues, but quickly agreed that it made the failure taste better. The bottle of kvas was disposed of as quickly as the brownies and it turned out that neither of them could in fact ‘keep up.’

They were absolutely intoxicated by the time they had finished. Alina grew warm and shrugged off the jacket leaving it, the dirty brownie pan, and empty bottle of kvas on the table as they made their way to her bedroom. At some point the fairy lights had been turned on and the overhead light turned off.

Alina and Nikolai lay on their backs, side by side, on top of the covers. They gazed up at the glow-in-the-dark stars.

“Thiz-iz nice!” Alina slurred.

“ _You_ can really-see _the_ stars _much clearer_ in-this part of the-city!” Nikolai’s words came out at an uneven pace and ran together in places.

Alina giggled uncontrollably.

“What?” He protested.

But the question fell on sleeping ears. Alina was already snoring and Nikolai followed suit quickly.

Together they rested underneath the fake stars, both feeling happier than they had in a long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Internal sounds of screaming* How cute was that?! XD I bet you didn't expect to see me again so soon, but the fluff practically wrote itself!
> 
> Way to be a douche though Mal! >.> At least _somebody_ knows how to respect women! Oh, and talking about that, I didn't have them do any hanky-panky (good lord how old am I?) due to their blood alcohol levels. There will be no non-con or dubious consent in this. Plus Nikolai knows Alina is a virgin and he would never let her first time be while drunk. lol knowing him he would have a private cruise ship filled with 80,000 roses or something!
> 
> You know, I once had an offer to ride on a friend's motorcycle. But it broke down the day before we were going to ride... which looking back is probably _very_ good timing, even if it didn't seem like it then.
> 
> Hoo boy, I'm just rambling now! I really hope you guys enjoyed the chapter! Be sure to let me know with comments or kudos. Otherwise I might find myself at the bottom of a kvas bottle! (Just kidding! :P)
> 
> Until next time! (*-*)"/"


	7. It Wasn’t a Mistake

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning! Two of the characters vomit in this chapter, one of which is describe in some detail. There is also talk of nausea throughout the chapter. Just thought I'd let you guys know as that can squeak people out!

 

Alina woke to the sound of what had to be a blaring siren in her ear. With each wail it felt like her head was splitting, cracking down the middle like an egg. Her entire body hurt, like she had been pushed off of a cliff… and then crushed by a falling anvil. Molten metal had replaced her eyes and her throat scratched painfully, but those were minuscule compared to the incessant throbbing of her head.

She wildly waved her hand in the direction of her alarm clock trying and failing to find it.

“Ughhh. Turn it off!” A low muffled moan called out next to her.

Alina yelped and shot up to a sitting position to find Nikolai lying beside her. Now that she was upright she was able to see her alarm clock and shut it off by slamming a hand down on it. Her mind spun and she felt like she might throw up.

_What in the Saints? What is Nikolai doing here? Why is he in my BED? Oh no. Did we… Am I still…_

She frantically searched her body with her hands and was relieved when they made contact with the clothes she had worn last night. But she was wearing a skirt so they still could have…

Hesitantly she pulled the waistband of her miniskirt away from her stomach. Her underwear was still in place, in all of their untouched Fruit of the Loom glory. She let out a deep whooshing breath. She may have been completely sloshed last night, with a horrific hangover to prove it, but it didn’t seem like she had lost control completely.

As the last grips of sleep left her she could finally remember flashes from the night before. The sound of shot glasses clinking together, the feeling of scalding brownie on her tongue, the deep shades of red Mal’s face had reached when talking to Nikolai.

Her coworker rolled over to lie on his back, wincing as the soft lights from her fairy lights hit his face, he covered his eyes with a hand and croaked, “what time is it?”

She glanced at the clock which read 4:13 AM. The deep primal fear of the working class filled her, she was late.

“Shit!” She swore and jumped out of the bed.

“Wha-?” Nikolai sat up to see Alina running around the room like a chicken with its head cut off. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m late! You’re late! _We’re late!_ ” If she wasn’t so severely hung over she would have been shouting, but a high pitched whisper was all she could manage.

Blearily Nikolai reached for the little clock and turned its face towards him. “No we aren’t. We still have plenty of time.”

She gaped at him, mid sock change. “Nikolai, it takes a good 30 minutes to walk there, so we have-” she glanced at the clock “two more minutes until we need to be out the door!”

He pushed his golden hair out of his eyes messily and despite a night of drinking and sleeping in a stranger’s bed his hair still looked perfect. If she took his picture right now he could easily make the cover of any magazine.

“Alina, I think you’re forgetting something.” He chuckled cheerfully.

“What? What is it that I could possibly be forgetting?!” She snapped at him as she grabbed randomly from her dresser. Her own voice rang painfully in her ears.

“We don’t have to walk. You see, I have this new-fangled contraption called a motorcycle. It has two wheels and goes ‘vroom’ very loudly… Although that could be annoying right now.” He clutched a hand to his head tenderly.

_Oh._

She stopped her scrambling. He was right. With the motorcycle the travel time would only be ten minutes.

“Ah, can I have a ride then?” She asked him awkwardly.

“I thought you’d never ask!” His smile oozed serene charm and if Alina hadn’t kept up with him shot for shot she wouldn’t have been able to tell that he was hungover.

She fought back the overwhelming urge to punch his perfect face.

“Well, I still need to get ready, so get out.”

Nikolai titled his head in confusion.

“I need to change. In _private_. Go to the bathroom or something.”

He leaned back onto one elbow. “I dunno, I’m pretty comfortable right here…”

She threw the first object she could find at him. It was a hairbrush and Nikolai very narrowly missed it’s tumbling ark.

“Wow, you really aren’t a morning person are you? Good to know!”

She forcefully ejected him from the bed and pushed him out the door, ignoring his whining and protests.

Alone in the room the extent of the night’s events pressed in on her. The terrible date, Nikolai loaning her money then giving her a ride home on his _motorcycle_ , Alina actually letting him into the house, Mal all but calling her a slut, Nikolai exclaiming over her art, Nikolai getting drunk with her, Nikolai sleeping in the same bed as her, waking up with Nikolai…

Alina felt a blush rise to her face. She shook her head quickly.

_I can’t think about that now or I’m really-actually-very-much going to be late._

She threw off the clothes from the night before and hastily donned the clothes she had grabbed at random from the dresser. After that she went to the bathroom to rub off the makeup from the night before. Genya must have used some sort of industrial-strength waterproof makeup, because it was almost untouched. She scrubbed at her face anyways, the look was way too much for an early morning barista and it felt heavy on her face. Once it was all removed she winced at her reflection, the dark circles under her eyes stood out and she looked about as sick as she felt.

She opened the door to the bathroom and almost ran into Nikolai. He held a glass of water in each hand and thrusted one under her nose.

“Drink.”

“Don’t tell me what to do Nikolai, I’m not five.” She frowned at him.

“Drink. Or I’m not giving you a lift to work.” He looked at her seriously.

“You’re not the one with the keys to the Brew.” She grumbled at him, but took the glass, not wanting to waste any more time.

They stood silently in the hallway chugging their waters. Once Alina finished hers she checked the time on her phone and swore loudly.

4:38 AM

“We’re going to be late! It’s 4:38!” She shouted in a panic.

“Not if I can help it!” For once Nikolai seemed to take the situation at hand seriously. He grabbed the glass back from Alina and dashed to the kitchen. Calling over his shoulder he confirmed that she had everything.

He came rushing out of the kitchen in the jacket that had been left there before they passed out. And in the entryway they rushed to put on their shoes.

“What the hell, Alina?” An angry voiced called from down the hall. Mal’s head popped out of his room and Alina froze.

_Why is Mal home? Is he going to think that I… that we…_

Nikolai tugged at her arm. “We got to go, Alina!”

They rushed out the door and she could only get out, “We’ll talk later!” before the door slammed shut behind them. Alina didn’t bother to lock it; they didn’t have time.

The motorcycle ride held none of the magic of the night before. Alina may have been less terrified, but she still held onto Nikolai for dear life. The motion of the bike also worked to increase her nausea and her stomach swirled ominously.

“I think I’m going to barf.” She shouted into the wind.

Nikolai accelerated. “Just don’t do it on me! Or my baby! Actually, especially on my baby. I’ve heard that stomach acid is the worst for leather.”

A part of her wanted to vomit then and there to spite him.

They pulled up to the Ravkan Brew with a screech of the tires and Alina almost fell when getting off of the bike. Alexei stood outside the door with his arms wrapped around himself and hopping from one foot to the other in the cold.

“Alina? What are you- You’re thirteen minutes late! And you didn’t answer my texts! I thought you were dead! What happened on your date? Why is Nikolai giving you a ride? What-”

Alina ignored him completely as she worked to unlock the doors. She had a more pressing matter at hand.

Once she pried the doors open she rushed past Alexei and headed straight for the staff bathroom. Not bothering to lock the door behind her she threw herself onto her knees so that they bracketed the toilet. She then proceeded to barf up the entire contents of her stomach and a piece of her small intestine for good measure.

Warm hands held back her hair as she did and Alina realized that Nikolai had followed her into the bathroom. He rubbed little circles on her lower back until she was done.

She wiped her mouth with her hand and slid into a seated position on the cold tiled floor.

“You okay?”

She gave a wry laugh. “The picture of health.”

Alexei opened the door to the bathroom. “Um, I hate to interrupt, but ah- well we have customers at the door and its 5:01.”

Alina groaned and hung her head in her hands for a moment. _It’s going to be a long day,_ she thought to herself then resignedly got to her feet to rinse out her mouth and wash her hands.

The cold water helped to make her feel a bit better and she went into her assistant manager mode. She made sure that the other two had clocked in then set Alexei to man the counter and Nikolai to take down all of the chairs. Alina clocked in herself then quickly did the odds and ends that should have been done before they opened. Being the assistant manager wasn’t really any different from being a regular employee except she got to boss the others around a bit more and was in charge of opening when the actual manager wasn’t there. With multiple Ravkan Brews in Os Alta the company had decided to have a circulating manager who checked in every once in a while to make sure everything was going smoothly.

Alina was very lucky that her manager hadn’t been there at opening to witness what had just happened. She just hoped that if anybody noticed how late she had clocked in that they would assume she had just forgotten or something.

Alina exited the backroom and was pleasantly surprised to see that Alexei and Nikolai had successfully managed to take care of the first morning rush. Alexei had the tendency to get overwhelmed and Nikolai was prone to slacking off. The combination could be dangerous at times, but Nikolai seemed to be working harder than usual.

_Maybe I should drink him under the table more often._

Seeing her exit the back room Nikolai came bounding up to her with a coffee cup in hand.

“Drink.” He insisted.

“Not this again.” She moaned.

“Drink.” He thrusted the beverage towards her.

Expecting another coconut milk late like before she took a large swig. It was a mistake. The drink had a slimy texture to it and tasted more like what she had just spit up than coffee. She spluttered, but managed to choke the mouthful down.

“What the hell, Nikolai?”

“It’s my patented hangover recipe.” He said with a crazed smile on his face that gave Alina concern for her health. She didn’t even want to know what was in it.

“You drink it then!” She thrusted the drink back to him. He accepted it with a shrug then proceeded to chug down all 12 ounces in one go. Alina winced.

About eight minutes later Nikolai turned very pale. “I’m taking my ten!” He shouted as he sprinted towards the staff bathroom. Alina and Alexei side eyed each other with a knowing look.

The rest of the morning proceeded relatively smoothly. Alina managed to plaster her customer service smile on her face even though she felt like she was dying inside. Her head continued to pound and her eyes burned, but she thought that she was at least past the worst of the nausea. The pace of customers was quick. Which Alina was thankful for as it prevented Alexei from pestering her with endless questions.

When her turn at a ten minute break came up she almost wept with relief. She fell into a heap onto her favorite pile of napkins in the back room after turning off the light. The cool darkness of the room wrapped around her and for the first time that day, she felt like she was going to make it. Unfortunately, it seemed like the universe had other plans.

Nikolai came rushing into the room then slammed the door behind himself. He leaned his back up against it as if he was barring an axe murder from entering. He actually looked… panicked. Alina had meant to go into angry assistant managerial mode, but instead shifted to concern.

“What’s wrong?”

Nikolai jumped as if he had forgotten Alina was in the room. He ran a hand through his hair for a moment, collecting himself.

“Ah, nothing! Just taking my 10!” He shifted so that he was leaning more casually against the door and flashed her a cheeky grin. “What are you up to?”

“Taking _my_ 10\. Get back to work, Nikolai!”

“About that, I was thinking we could switch.”

She looked at him incredulously. “But you’ve already taken yours. There’s nothing to switch with.”

He looked a bit lost at that. “Oh, Ah…” He trailed off.

A sudden realization washed over Alina. “Wait. You left Alexei out there by himself? You know he cracks under pressure!”

Giving up on actually getting Nikolai to do his job she shoved past him. It was more important to make sure that Alexei didn’t accidentally blow up the espresso machine or something.

The light of the bright coffee shop hit her face and she winced as a knife twisted behind her eyes. It was good that she had come out though, because a wave of customers had just hit them and Alexei was already looking flustered as he ran between the register and the drink station.

“Oh thank the Saints, I’m dying out here! Can you take the register?” Alexei asked her and Alina wanted to point out that he had only been alone for a few minutes, but decided that it would only make things worse.

It wasn’t until she had finished with the first customer in line that she saw him, the handsome business man who hadn’t called her stood a few people back in line.

_What is he doing here!? It’s been almost a week without a text or call then he just shows up? Who does that? Maybe he lost my number… But, that would mean that he lost my sketch and that paper is way too big to just misplace. He doesn’t look like the type to misplace things either. Maybe he threw it out then… asshole._

Her mind panicked as the number of customers dwindled between them.

And then he was standing in front of her. All clean angular lines, smoldering eyes, and assured confidence. Alina gulped.

“This is a bit of Déjà brew isn’t it?” He asked her with a smirk.

 _What?_ Alina was confused. She understood the pun, but why was he using it? _Why wouldn’t he just call?_ It was too much for hungover mind. She was cranky, in pain, and supposed to be on break right now.

It was clear to her that the man was just making fun of her at this point. Jerking her around because he could.

“What can I get for you, sir?” Her words were tight with irritation and she knew that her smile had slipped away.

His wry smile fell away as well and his face became impassive. The only emotion she could see was the slight narrow of annoyance around his eyes.

“16 ounce shot in the dark.”

_Of course he didn’t say please. Douche._

She wrote the order down on a cup, but didn’t bother with a doodle this time. As she was ringing him up she caught a glimpse of the sticky note she had attached to his one hundred dollar tip. She handed it to him separate from his change, not bothering to remove the colorful paper.

“Here, I’m sure you didn’t mean to leave such a large tip last time.” She stared at her outstretched hand, avoiding his eyes.

“It wasn’t a mistake,” he said coolly, but took the money from her anyways.

Alina heard a choking sound from behind her as Alexei observed the exchange.

_Okay, what the heck is going on?_

The handsome man walked to the end of the counter to wait for his drink, signaling that the conversation was officially over. The next customer caught her attention and she went back to work.

“Don’t mind her, she’s just cranky!” Alexei stage whispered conspiratorially and Alina looked up to glare at him. He picked up a coffee by its lid and started to hold it out the the other man.

Suddenly everything moved slower. Alina could see the way the disposable cup wobbled and she tried to call out a warning. But it was too late.

The cup fell away from its lid, tilting as it went. The handsome customer hopped back nimbly but it wasn’t enough. The pitch black liquid poured onto his shoes and pooled around his feet like an insistent shadow.

Alexei looked aghast, still holding the lid in the air. Alina dropped what she was doing and rounded the counter.

“Are you okay? Did it burn you?” She grabbed a handful of napkins as she went and crouched down in front of his drenched feet.

He took a step back out of the puddle. “I’m fine.” He said flatly.

Frantically Alexei pulled napkins out of the holder one by one and threw them so that they landed in an unhelpful pile by the man’s feet. She glared up at him. “Alexei, just stop it! Take care of the other customers!” She snapped.

Wiping at the man’s shoes she looked up at him. “Are you sure you’re okay? We have a burn kit.”

“Really I’m fine, get up.”

Alina suddenly realized her awkward position and stood hastily, her face reddening.

“And you’re sure,” she asked him a third time, not knowing what else to say.

“I’m fine. But, ah- the shoes are ruined.”

“Let me buy you a new pair!” She said, desperate to rectify the situation.

She glanced down at his shoes, actually noticing their quality for the first time. They looked nice. Really nice. Like sell-your-first-born-child nice.

“You’d never be able to afford it.” The words were said in a matter of fact tone, without malice, but Alina still burned at the insult.

The asshole, because that was how Alina defined him now, turned on his heel and left without another word.

She stood staring after him full of confusion and embarrassment. Her head throbbed.

And that was it. Alina had reached her threshold. Not caring that there were customers around she yelled for Nikolai. “Get your lazy ass out here right now, Nikolai, or you are fired!”

“Um, Alina, you don’t have the authority to fire anyone.” Alexei stage whispered again with a little grin. It was a mistake.

She rounded on him. “And _you!_ You should know better not to lift the drinks by the lid!”

Alexei paled before her and she took a sick sort of pleasure in it.

She continued her yelling. “And you want to know how that date went last night? Terribly! I’ve never been so humiliated in my life and it’s all your fault, Alexei. So just _shut it!_ ” She punctuated her last words with a flutter of her hands.

The entire coffee shop had fallen quite around her. Alexei, now joined by Nikolai, looked at her from behind the counter in shock.

Embarrassed at her own rage, her voice became quiet, but she still couldn’t keep the anger out of it. “Nikolai, just… please clean this up before somebody actually gets hurt.”

She took off her apron and made her way to the back room. “I’m taking my ten and when I come back out we are _not_ speaking of this.”

They both nodded mutely. Clearly afraid of her.

_Good._

The rest of the work day was uneventful. She didn’t talk to Nikolai or Alexei unless she absolutely had to and as soon as her shift was over she left without saying good bye. When she met Genya before their shift at the boutique, Alina tersely told her that she didn’t feel like talking. Genya made an ill received joke about using lipstick to draw a smile on Alina, then was quiet for the rest of the evening.

By the time Alina made it back to her house she was emotionally and physically spent. She had walked home slowly, trying to avoid the conversation she had promised Mal that morning, but once she got there he wasn’t even home.

The place was dark and empty. Alina went to the kitchen to find something to eat. The empty pan and bottle of kvas still rested on the table.

 _How did last night turn into this?_ She wondered then noticed a note resting on the table.

_“Alina-_

_Stop leaving your dirty dishes lying around. You’re going to attract every vermin in a five-mile radius. But maybe that’s your goal?_

_-Mal_

_P.S. Keep your over-night guests quite in the morning.”_

Alina crumpled the note in her hand then deposited it in the empty brownie tin.

_Hypocrite!_

She couldn’t count the number of times Mal’s “over-night guests” had woken her up or the number of dirty dished he had left for Alina to clean up. She hadn’t even left dishes, plural, there was one dirty plate and a recyclable. It would have been so much easier for him to just wash it instead of writing out a note.

And what was with the vermin comment? Was that a poorly veiled reference to Nikolai? Did he really think she was sleeping around now and would be bringing over even more guys?

Alina’s head still hurt. She obviously hadn’t hydrated or eaten enough today. But she gave up her food hunt, suddenly too tired to try and put anything together. She went straight to bed, not bothering to clean up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter didn't come as easily as the last one, but I hope it still worked out in the end. I find that I have a surprisingly easier time writing Alina/Nikolai than Alina/Darkling. Which is odd for me because I don't actually ship Alina and Nikolai in the series? ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
> 
> I've never actually been hungover before (I'm currently almost 24) which I attribute to a very attentive boyfriend who holds water under my nose all night long! XD
> 
> Anyways I hope you guys liked the chapter! Comments and kudos are much appreciated! It's vain, but they are my lifeblood. :P
> 
> Until next time! ヾ( ‘ – ‘*)


	8. His Shadows

Alina woke that morning expecting to feel like death itself. But it seemed that going to bed early and letting herself actually sleep in for a change seemed to have finally released her from the clutches of her massive hangover. Sure she had only slept in until 8 AM, but that was four hours of extra sleep for her.

She gave a contented little sigh and rolled over to look at her phone. It read 14 unread messages. She jolted upright. _Did somebody die?_ She wondered at first, but quickly realized that she hadn’t really looked at her phone since she had gone on the terrible Tinder date two nights ago.

Alexei:  
>> How is it going? (9:15 PM Thur)  
>> Is he hotttt? (9:15 PM Thur)  
>> Oh no, is he actually a balding middle aged man? (9:30 PM Thur)  
>> Have you been catfished? Do I need to rescue you? lol (9:46 PM Thur)  
>> Alina? (10:02 PM Thur)  
>> Are you okay? I’m kinda getting worried… (10:11PM Thur)  
>> OMG Alina, please please PLEASE just be having wild 1st date sex and not be lying in a ditch somewhere!!!1!n(10:30PM Thur)  
>> Shit I fell asleep and forgot to check in on you again! ARE YOU OKAY? (4:00AM Fri)  
>> It’s freezing! Where are you?! It’s almost time to open! (4:40AM Fri)  
>> If you aren’t here or don’t text me by 5 I’m putting out an Amber Alert or something! (4:45AM Fri)

Alina’s stomach twisted a bit with guilt. No wonder Alexei had been pestering her with all those questions yesterday.

Alexei:  
>> Okay, I thought it over and despite NOT REALLY being at fault as you did pick out your Tinder date YOURSELF, I am formally apologizing to you for your date last night. Could you not bite my head off next time though? <3 (8:32PM Fri)

Okay, maybe she felt a bit less guilty. The message was kind of passive aggressive, but Alina guessed that she maybe deserved it after losing her mind at him yesterday. She sent him a quick text back.

<< I might MAYBE have overreacted and I’m MAYBE sorry.

She continued onto a message sent from Genya.

Genya:  
>> Alexei told me that you lost it at the Brew today? What the heck happened? Is that why you weren’t up to talking earlier? (8:59PM Fri)

Alina immediately regretted apologizing to Alexei. She was too tired to rail against him again so she just sent him another message saying “Snitch.”

Finally, she opened up her most recent message from a number she didn’t recognize.

Unknown Number:  
>> Hey, it’s Nikolai! (Alexei gave me your number, but please don’t kill him) I know you’re super mad at me for slacking off at work constantly and I wanted to make it up to you sometime. Maybe I could take you out to dinner? (1:04AM Sat)  
>> (^ ♡ ~)/ (1:05AM Sat)

Alina resisted the urge to text Alexei again. She wanted to call him a _dead_ snitch, but she consoled herself by changing his name to it in her phone.

She stared at Nikolai’s text, not quite sure what to make of it. Was he… asking her out?

No. She shook her head. That was ridiculous! Guys like Nikolai didn’t ask out scrawny things like Alina. He probably just wanted to look like a decent guy or was afraid of Alina reporting him to the manager or something. She ignored the text, opting to head for the kitchen for breakfast.

The refrigerator was even more barren than it had been two nights ago. It was Mal’s turn to go shopping, but she doubted that would happen any time soon. She resigned herself to eating the last thing left, a slightly browned banana.

She leaned against the cold countertop and peeled the fruit gingerly, trying to ignore the way it squished too easily. Glancing around the kitchen she immediately noticed that the empty bottle of kvas and the dirty brownie pan were still sitting on the kitchen table along with the crumpled note, unmoved from the center of the brownie pan.

She wondered if Mal had seen it. She wasn’t even sure he had come home last night. After washing out the kvas bottle and setting the brownie pan to soak in the sink she made her way to Mal’s bedroom.

She was still furious with him, but now that the throbbing in her head had subsided, she was at least feeling ready to talk.

“Mal?” She knocked quietly at the door.

No answer.

She knocked a bit harder.

Still no answer. She tried the door handle and found it to be unlocked.

“Mal, I’m coming in, so if you’re there you better be decent!”

Mal’s bedroom door was the hardest in the house to open. It took all of Alina’s weight thrown at the thing to open it, so she didn’t have the luxury of just cracking it open to take a peek. That morning it took three tries before the door finally gave way and Alina tumbled into the room after it.

“Saints curse that door.” She swore under her breath. “Sorry!” The room was empty though, so there wasn’t anybody to apologize to. Her stomach dropped a bit in disappointment.

Her roommate’s bedroom was almost completely opposite to hers. It was neat and tidy with very little personality to it. The room was slightly larger than hers, but other than a huge bed in the center of it and a small dresser against one wall, there wasn’t any other furniture.

Growing up in the foster care system meant that they had very little personal possessions. It was only whatever they could fit in a duffle bag or a backpack. After so many years of having almost nothing, Alina and Mal had ended up on two ends of the spectrum. Mal had continued to limit his possessions while Alina had become an utter pack rat. Every inch of her room was cluttered with things to make it feel like her own, while Mal continued to live like he might be shipped off at any moment.

It always made Alina’s heart hurt a bit to look at Mal’s room. It was especially worse when Mal wasn’t in it. Without his bright warm presence, the room was just a room. There was nothing in it to suggest that he ever even set foot in it.

Well, except for one thing. Alina’s eyes shifted automatically to the large canvas over his bed. It was one of her sun women. She had painted it for him shortly after they had moved in, when she realized that Mal had no interested in adding any décor to his room on his own.

The woman had a long golden braid that she dangled over a crib. She looked like she was glowing softly as she stared lovingly at the sleeping baby with messy brown hair who slept in it. Alina had given the woman some of Mal’s characteristic features. A lopsided smile, bright blue eyes, and thick eyebrows that tapered delicately at the ends. She was supposed to look like she was related to Mal, a mother or an aunt or a sister.

When Mal and Alina had been little they used to sneak out at night to look at the stars. On one of those nights Mal confided that he couldn’t really remember much about his family before the foster care system. Alina didn’t either and they swapped foggy memories until there was nothing left to tell. So when Alina decided to make a piece of art for Mal to make his room more personal, she chose to recreate one of his memories.

It was one of her best works. She had thrown all of her love for Mal in it, romantic, platonic, or otherwise. Looking up at it now made some of her anger soften. She was still hurt and confused and annoyed at Mal, but looking at that painting made her want to try harder.

She sent him a text.

<< I don’t know what is going on with us right now, but I would really like to talk. (And I promise not to bite your head off… much)  
<< <3

Looking at the painting she was also reminded of Nikolai and how he had asked her what was next when looking at her art. Alina had been organizing and reorganizing her portfolio for months without actually doing something with it. And it was time for that to change.

She fired a text back to Genya who responded immediately.

<< Yeah, work at the brew was shit yesterday and I didn’t want to talk about it. I still don’t want to but I was wondering something.

>> What?

<< Would you want to go with me to different galleries today to show off my portfolio?

>> !!!!!!!!!!  
>> FINALLY!  
>> OF COURSE!  
>> Can I do your makeup first though?

Alina sighed a bit, embarrassed at Genya’s enthusiasm. It wasn’t like she had been _that_ depressing about her art… Had she?

She texted back and forth with Genya for a bit until they settled on a plan. Alina would get dressed and then Genya would come over to do her makeup _and hair_. After that they would visit at least four art galleries in Os Alta. It was a big city, so there were countless more, but they decided to start with the ones within walking distance of her house.

Showing off her portfolio was a lesson in disappointment. One of the gallery managers took one look at Alina in her thrifted suit, clutching her also thrifted portfolio case, and told her that they weren’t accepting portfolios or resumes at that time. Two others looked at her portfolio, but didn’t seem interested. Of those two, one of them accepted her portfolio.

Once they walked up to the last of the four Alina was completely dejected and the pep talk Genya was trying to give her wasn’t helping. It went in one ear and out the other.

“Alina? Are you even listening?”

“What? Oh, sorry.”

Genya rolled her eyes at her. “I _said_ would you like to go into this one alone while I go grab us coffee? That way you can enjoy it when you’re done.”

“So a consolation prize.” Alina said flatly.

Genya growled with annoyance. “Not a consolation prize. A reward. Because you and I both know that this is hard for you to put yourself out there again. Any you deserve a treat afterwards, whether or not anything comes of it.”

Alina opened her mouth to protest, but Genya shoved her through the door with a “Go get’em!” before she ran off.

Alina stumbled into the gallery. Luckily nobody was manning the front desk at that moment so she was saved from the embarrassment of a klutzy first impression. She walked up to the desk and saw it had a little bell to ring for assistance. She didn’t press it though; she was too nervous to draw attention to herself like that. Instead she decided to take a little look around the gallery until someone noticed her, or took pity on her.

The gallery had a quiet, serious vibe to it. Like a library, but instead of the smell of dusty books the sharp, rich smell of oil paints cut through the air. The brick exterior of the building had been in the classical Ravkan style, but the interior was super modern with white walls and pale concrete floors. There was a scattering of very uncomfortable looking furniture that was also white. In fact, the only color in the room came from the art on the walls.

Most of the art was on huge canvases, almost taller than her, but what interested Alina more was a series of smaller paintings. Like the others, they were oil based, but they were much darker than anything else in the gallery.

Shades of shadows upon twilight upon ink upon obsidian. At first it was hard to make anything out, but once she really looked she could see what hid in the dark. The first painting she looked at was of two hands held together so fiercely that skin bunched and knuckles paled. It was fascinating, a technique she hadn’t ever seen before. She moved from painting to painting in the collection, until she identified the subject of every single one.

Once she was done she moved to return to her favorite, the first one she looked at, but something rammed into the back of her knees causing her legs to give out. Alina gave a startled yelp as a large fluffy dog attacked her with kisses. After her initial shock subsided she laughed and dove into the dog’s black fur with unrestrained glee.

“Oh! Who’s a sweetie?” She cooed and fawned over the dog who was pinning her to the ground.

Alina had always loved dogs, but she had never been allowed to have one when she was younger and now that she was older she didn’t think she could afford one. She was waiting until she had a bit more time and money to get one. So whenever a dog showed her any kind of attention it was the highlight of her day.

Another fluffy black dog came trotting up to her as well and it was like a miniature version of the first one.

Alina gave a soft gasp. “Are you the baby?” She whispered to it as the little thing fought for room on her lap. Both of the pups were warm and soft, and despite their dark coloring they reminded her of sunshine.

She couldn’t believe her luck, she felt blessed.

“Volcra! Vo’ya! Heel!” A man’s voice sounded behind Alina startling both her and the dogs. They immediately hopped of of her and stared guiltily at the ground.

“I’m very sorry. Are you okay? I thought that I had trained them better, but sometimes-” The man stopped short and Alina’s mouth fell open when they each realized who they were talking to.

The asshole customer from yesterday was standing over her with his arms crossed.

She couldn’t believe her misfortune, she felt cursed.

“What are you doing here?” They said in unison. Alina blushed, he looked unamused, and an awkward silence passed between them.

“Are these your dogs?” She asked gesturing to the them and he nodded. The dogs seemed to take that as an invitation to tackle her again. They were on her again in an instant, further coating her suit in fur and slobber. She welcomed them anyways.

“Heel!” The man insisted again. The dogs jumped off of her, but at a noticeably slower pace than last time. Alina wished they wouldn’t go. Without their comforting presence she was more aware of her awkward position on the ground.

She moved to get up, but a piece of paper on the ground caught her eye. Her portfolio had sprung open, littering the ground with her artwork. She had been so distracted with the dogs that she hadn’t even noticed.

“My art!” She scrambled to pick it all up.

She heard a sigh from above her and when she glanced up he was stooping over to help her.

“You don’t have to!” She said nervously, but he ignored her.

Once all of the pages were picked up they rose and he handed her art back to her.

“What are you doing in my gallery, Alina?”

She gaped at him. _His gallery? He remembers my name?_

_His gallery??_

“This is your gallery?”

His eyes tightened with impatience. “My name _is_ on the front of the building.”

No. He couldn’t be. That would mean he was-

“You’re Aleksander Morozova?” She knew her mouth was hanging open but she couldn’t help herself.

“Yes.” Aleksander gave her an odd look and spoke the word slowly like she was an idiot.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I did.”

“No you didn’t.”

He pinched the bridge of his nose in exasperation. “I don’t have time for this. Can I help you with something?” The words came out clipped and impatient, it was obvious that he wanted to do anything but.

Alina had a mission though. This was her last gallery and she just had to ask him to look over her portfolio. Then she could skedaddle and drink coffee with Genya.

Before she could lose her nerve she thrust the old portfolio case at him. “Could-you-look-at-this-please?” The words came out in a quick jumble.

_Saints! What is it about this man that makes be absolutely incapable of talking?_

Aleksander raised an eyebrow, but accepted the portfolio anyways. As Alina’s hands fell to her sides the larger dog pushed his forehead into her hand for pets. Not to be outdone, the smaller one sat down on her foot.

Their owner scoffed at the seeming betrayal of his two dogs, but let them be.

The larger dog licked the palm of her hand insistently and Alina couldn’t help herself. She gently withdrew her foot from under the puppy then crouched down to pet the both of them. They were absolutely adorable and perfect.

“What were their names again?”

Without looking up from her work he said, “The larger one is Vo’ya and the smaller one is Volcra, she’s the oldest.”

Alina gathered up Volcra into her arms. “You’re the older one? But you’re so little!” She nuzzled her face into the thick black fur around Volcra’s neck.

“Volcra is a Schipperke and Vo’ya is a Groenendael.” He said as if that explained anything.

Signaling that the conversation was over he snapped her portfolio shut and extended it to her. “I’m sorry, your art is definitely interesting, but I’m just not looking to add any pieces at his time.”

Alina worked to hide her disappointment from her face. Giving each pup a farewell pat she stood up to accept the portfolio. As he handed it off their fingers brushed for a moment that seemed to linger just a bit longer than it should have.

“Why didn’t you text me?” The question was out of her mouth before she even knew she was asking it. Her free hand shot up to cover her mouth, as if to prevent further embarrassment from leaking out.

“I did.” The odd look was back on his face.

“No you didn’t.”

“Not this again.” He reached into his suit pocket and pulled out a phone. He tapped at it a few times before handing it to her. “Here.”

Her name was at the top of the screen and underneath it an outgoing message read: “This is Aleksander Morozova, from the park today. Would you be interested in dinner some time?”

With a creeping sense of dread, she doubled checked the contact number while he waited patiently. It was correct.

 _Oh no_.

Her phone was 6 years old.

It sometimes didn’t get messages or dropped calls unexpectedly.

That meant…

_I’m the asshole who didn’t text back, not him._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay! Another chapter! Sorry that this one took a bit longer. I originally thought I'd have Alina run into Aleksander in the park, but decided that having a new location would help to move the plot along. Plus of all of the characters, I find that Aleksander is the hardest to write! :P
> 
> I hope that you liked the text messages and that their format weren't too hard to read!
> 
> Also, if you don't know what a Schipperke or Groenendael (Belgian Shepherd) I highly recommend you google them! So cute!
> 
> Anyways! I hope you enjoyed! If you did, just know that I greatly appreciate comments and kudos! :P
> 
> Till next time! ( ^ 3 ^)ﾉ⌒♡*:･。


	9. Out of Season Almond Kulich

“I’m so sorry! My phone it’s…” Alina clumsily switched her portfolio from under one arm to the other to pull out her phone.

She held it up to Aleksander as evidence. “It’s really old and sometimes it doesn’t get texts or it drops calls. Usually if people don’t hear back from me in a few days they’ll try again. But I didn’t think to tell you that, so how would you know? And then I was so rude to you in the coffee shop! I’m really sorry! And I did think that your ‘déjà brew’ pun was good I was just really confused and cranky and frankly hungover. And-”

Alina stopped suddenly with the realization that she had revealed much more than she had intended in her ramblings. Aleksander was smirking at her, his slate grey eye dancing with restrained laughter. She shoved her ancient brick of a phone back into her pocket with embarrassment.

Aleksander probably thought she was crazy at this point. Or at the very least he had correctly figured out just how socially inadequate she was.

“I’ll admit that our last interaction was a bit… disconcerting.” Aleksander admitted.

Alina fought back a groan. She avoided his eyes in favor of staring at Volcra and Vo’ya who sat patiently in between them. She couldn’t think of a single thing to say that would salvage the situation. Luckily he continued.

“I would like to apologize as well. It wasn’t like I was on my best behavior yesterday either.”

Alina winced as she recalled the way he said that she could never afford his shoes. _Yeah, that wasn’t great. But at least he apologized?_ She snuck a glance up at him and he ran a hand through his dark black hair. _Is he… nervous too?_ She wondered. _But why would he be nervous?_

A flash of auburn outside of the large gallery windows caught Alina’s attention. Genya was staring into the gallery like Alina and Aleksander were zoo animals. Her nose was even slightly squished against the glass and the area underneath was foggy with her breath. There was a disposable coffee cup clutched in each of her hands.

Alina panicked. _How long has she been there? Saints! I can’t let Aleksander see her ogling us!_

“Ah, well! I should get going!” She flashed him a crazed grin before bolting towards the door. Her foot caught on some invisible object and she slammed into the door instead of pushing it open like any other human being would. Hastily she found the push bar and tumbled out of the gallery, the bright sound of a melodic laughter following her.

As she stumbled out the door, Genya greeted her with a wide grin and waggling eyebrows. “And who is that?”

“Oh, cram it!” Alina snapped before forcefully tugging Genya along as she sprinted out of sight.

Genya whined, but allowed herself to be dragged. Alina didn’t slow down until they were two blocks out of sight, at which point they were both out of breath.

Genya shoved one of the coffees at Alina so that she could use her hand to clutch at her chest. “Alina,” she panted, “what- ha- the heck?”

“That’s the guy! The hot customer I told you about!”

Genya’s eyes went wide and she gave a low appreciative whistle. “Marry him.”

“I can’t marry him! He already knows what a complete train wreck I am!” Alina gestured up and down the length of her body with her hand.

“More like total babe!”

“No.”

“Yes!”

“No!”

Alina had no idea why all of her conversations kept dissolving into strings of one word arguments. She tried a different approach. “Look, it has to do with yesterday. I made a complete ass of myself and practically licked his shoes at one point!”

“Kinky.” Genya smirked.

Alina groaned. “You don’t get it. I can’t talk around him and I end up saying really dumb stuff. Or when I finally manage to say something half decent my voice comes out all weird. He can’t find that remotely attractive.”

Genya gave Alina a long stare. “Well he looked interested from where I was standing.”

“Yeah, what was that by the way? You were looking at us like we were animals in the zoo about to mate.”

“Were you?” Her head tilted a bit and her eyes glinted with amusement, but Alina didn’t catch on.

“What?”

“About to mate?”  Genya practically cooed, her smile pure wickedness.

Alina gave a strangled cry of dismay. “I don’t know why I tell you anything.”

Their conversation was interrupted by a chime coming from Alina’s pocket indicating that she had gotten a text message. She hurriedly fished it out, pitifully hoping that it was Aleksander.

Dead Snitch  
>> How am I a snitch?

Alina let out a huff of disappointment and frustration before texting Alexei back.  
<< You know what you did.

Of course she got all of Alexei’s texts, while she missed the text from the super-hot guy. Life really wasn’t fair.

“Expecting someone?” Genya teased.

“Yup! That was David. We’re like BFFs now and we talk about you behind your back all the time.” Alina teased, keeping her voice and face as serious as possible.

Her friend’s face soured. “What?! He hardly ever texts me!”

Alina laughed. “I’m kidding! Wooow, you really have it bad.”

Genya flushed which was shocking to Alina. Genya was the queen of confidence, she almost never blushed. In their friendship she was the one who flirted with the pizza delivery person, or stared the cashier in the eye when she bought condoms, or gave Alina crotchless panties as a joke. In the past Genya had always been a champion of her own love life, taking and giving no shits. So if she was blushing over David and letting obvious jokes fly over her head it must be serious.

Alina had an idea. They were currently wandering aimlessly through downtown Os Alta, but she thought she could make their direction a bit more purposeful without Genya noticing. They continued to chat away as Alina dished out the details of everything that had happened with Aleksander. When that conversation flagged, she started in on the key points of the disastrous Tinder date to keep Genya entertained and occupied.

“Saints, I wish you could have heard the noise that the candied fruits made when they hit him! Oh and his _face_!” Alina pantomimed fruit hitting her face, eyes bugging out and mouth hanging open like a trout. Genya was in stitches

“So what did you do after that?” She asked in between chuckles.

Alina shrugged. “Well, I ran into Nikolai and he gave me a ride home.”

Genya’s eyebrows shot up in surprise. “Wow, letting him take you home? You two seem to be even cozier than I thought.”

“What?”

“Look at your cup.”

Alina glanced at her cup. It was from the Ravkan Brew, but other than that she didn’t see anything of interest. “Ummmm...”

Genya rolled her eyes like it should be obvious. Reaching over she twisted the cup in Alina’s hand, revealing a lopsided heart drawn on the side in sharpie.

“Nikolai made our coffee this morning.” She showed off her cup as well. “And he didn’t doodle diddly squat on mine.”

It was Alina’s turn to blush. “That doesn’t mean anything!” She grabbed both of their empty cups and threw them in a nearby trashcan.

Genya’s stare remained unconvinced, causing Alina to scramble.

“I mean he spent the night, but that was only because we were drunk!”

“What?!”

“No! Not like that! We made brownies that were terrible so we started drinking and got carried away and we both fell asleep on my bed.” What was with all of the rambling today? Alina wished that she didn’t have a mouth. It would really be better for everyone that way.

Her friend’s face was a unique mix of disbelief, pride, and concern.

Alina groaned again and clutched a hand to her head as if she was having phantom hangover pain. “I guess I should show you something, but if I do… promise not to blow it out of proportion?”

Genya nodded eagerly in a way that said she was absolutely going to blow it out of proportion. Alina opened her phone up to the text from Nikolai asking her to dinner and passed it to Genya.

Her friend emitted a loud shriek and jumped up and down. “He asked you out!”

Several heads turned their way and Alina snatched the phone back from Genya. “It’s just an apology for always slacking. He’s probably just worried about losing his job! I thought you said you would be chill about this?”

“Alina, he asked you to dinner with a winky face! A _winky face!!_ ” Genya emphasized.

Alina paused. _Was he asking me out? No, that’s crazy. We’re just friends and I’m practically his boss. I’ve seen the type of girl he flirts with and I’m not one of them._ She shrugged off Genya, “You’re crazy.”

Suddenly her phone was being whisked back out of her hands and Genya bolted off with it, typing as she went. She chased after her, but by the time she got the phone back the damage had been done.

<< You still want to grab dinner? Maybe pizza?

>> Sounds great! (ノ*°▽°*)ノ

>> How about tonight?

<< That works. 7 PM?

>> It’s a date! ♡

<< Perfect (:

>> ☆*:.｡.o(〃♡ ▽ ♡〃)o.｡.:*☆

“Genya! He’s going to get the wrong idea!” Alina wailed after reading the texts and seeing the excited emoji’s he had sent. _How does he even make those?_

“Oh, I think he’s going to get exactly the right idea.” Genya was back to waggling her eyebrows.

Alina hung her head in her hands.

“Oh come on! I set it up so that it’s just pizza. Not a big deal! Besides you need to get out there!”

Alina opened her mouth to protest, but Genya continued. “And no, your last Tinder date doesn’t count!”

Maybe she was crazy or just exhausted from all of the spontaneous running that day, but she finally gave in. “Ugh, you’re worse than Alexei! But fine. I’ll _hang out_ with Nikolai tonight.” She emphasized the words ‘hang out’ to be clear that they were just friends.

“It’s a _date_. He said so himself.”

“Genya, if you don’t shut up I won’t let you do my makeup.”

Horrified, Genya stopped mid inhalation.

They continued to walk in silence for a bit, but after another block Genya couldn’t help herself.

“Can I just say one more thing?” She asked.

“No.”

“But-” Genya started to protest.

“You can’t say anything else because we’re here.” It was Alina’s turn to smirk. Genya had fallen right into her trap.

They were standing in front of Dvorets Patisserie, a cute little bakery nestled into the heart of the downtown area. Its front door was painted a bright red and there was sign in the window made of bread that read ‘open.’  They made some of the best pastries in Os Alta and it was Genya’s favorite bakery.

It was also where David worked. He was one of the bakers who worked in the back, although he preferred to be called a food scientist.

Genya’s blush had returned in full force, almost as dark as her hair, and she was a sputtering mess as Alina pushed her into the door.

They were greeted by the owner of the bakery, a nice middle aged woman who always had free pastries for Genya. The woman’s daughter used to have terrible acne before Genya had found her a good skin care routine.

“Genya! Alina!” The baker grinned warmly over the counter. “What brings you in today?”

Genya continued to blush and was at a loss for words. It was honestly astounding to Alina.

“Is David in today?” Alina asked the woman sweetly, ignoring a sharp elbow to her side.

“He’s in the back, go on ahead!” She gestured them to the kitchen and as they passed she winked at Genya and said “Good luck!”

Alina covered a cackle with a cough.

The kitchen was very industrial with metal counter tops and appliances. It was in complete contrast to the cutesy front room that the other customers saw. David was sitting with his back turned to them on tall stool in front of one of the counter tops. There was a collection of bowls all holding some sort of chocolate mixture in front of him and he seemed to be taking notes on them.

“David!” Genya called. It seemed like excitement at seeing her crush had won out over embarrassment.

He turned around causing his long brown hair to fall over his eyes. He pushed it back with one hand, creating a streak of flour on his cheekbone. Alina was pretty sure she could hear Genya’s heart thump.

He grunted a quick “hey” before turning around and scribbling in his notebook.

Alina had no idea how any straight man (and he was straight, Genya had checked and double checked) could ignore Genya like that. But the skinny pastry nerd seemed to be immune to her charms.

They walked over to him and Genya leaned provocatively on the counter. “What are you up to David?”

He didn’t look up or stop writing. “I’m figuring out the exact ratio of dry ingredients to wet that will produce the best brownie consistency. After that I’m going to experiment with cooking time versus oven temperature.”

Alina’s stomach twisted at the mention of brownies. Maybe she would be able to think about them one day without gagging. Today was not that day.

She went to go inspect another part of the kitchen to get her mind off of the offensive pastries. In the corner was a tray of what looked to be some kind of kulich, but that didn’t make any sense as kulich was only ever made in the spring.

“David, what’s this?” She called across the room, gesturing to the little cakes.

Without looking up he seemed to know what she was referring to and confirmed that they were in fact kulich.

“Ohh! Kulich? I love kulich, especially almond ones!” Genya exclaimed as she crossed over to Alina’s side of the kitchen.

Was it Alina’s imagination or had David glanced up as Genya left her side?

“You can have as many as you want. We can’t sell them because they’re out of season.” David said, his back still turned.

Genya pounced on one of the cakes, but something seemed slightly off to Alina. “Why did you make them if it’s not spring?” She asked him.

Before he could answer, Genya let out a long delighted moan. “They’re almond flavored too!” She shoved another in her mouth and hummed as her eyes fluttered closed.

Alina walked back to David as Genya gorged herself. “Hmm David? Why make them if you can’t sell them?”

He blushed and mumbled something about practice.

“Oh David. These are delicious!” Genya called to him. “Can I take some home?” He blushed even more as he nodded. His face was practically in his notebook at that point.

After another round of praise from Genya and further blushing from David that went unnoticed, they packed up the rest of the kulich at David’s insistence.

As they were leaving the store owner stopped them. “Ah! I see you liked kulich David made!” She gave a little chuckle. “When he first asked me for the recipe out of season, I was really confused. But when he said it was for Genya it all made sense.”

Genya looked like her entire world view had shifted in an instant. And Alina guessed that it had. The two of them left giggling like lunatics.

They went to Genya’s house so that she could do Alina’s makeup before she hung out with Nikolai. Genya tried to force some more wardrobe choices onto Alina, but that was where she drew the line.

“We’re just hanging out! I’ll let you do my makeup like you do for work, but anything else would be overkill! Plus, I almost broke my ankle in the shoes you gave me last time!”

Genya tried to convince Alina to let her do her hair as well, but she backed off when Alina threatened to wash off her makeup.

After strict instructions not to crease her face (whatever that meant) Genya let Alina go home to change. It was clear from the moment that she opened the door that Mal still hadn’t been home. The realization caused a knife to twist in Alina’s chest, but she tried to ignore it.

She changed into a simple pair of jeans and a T-shirt. She didn’t want Nikolai to think that she thought this was anything more than friends hanging out. Because that’s all it was… wasn’t it?

Her phone chimed and she reached for it thinking that it would be Nikolai telling her that he outside already. But the message was from an unknown number.

Unknown number  
>> At the risk of this not going through, I would still like to re-extend my offer for dinner.

Aleksander had texted her. And for some absurd reason still wanted to go out with her.

_Saints._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ohhhhhh! Things are heating up! XD I'm so excited to write the next chapter! Lots of Nikolina fluff and confusion. The chapter after that will be more Alarkling ;).
> 
> Also, who knows where Mal is. Probably off being a dick somewhere lol
> 
> 'Dvorets' is Russian for 'Palace' and 'Patisserie' is French for 'Bakery' (just cuz I like the word patisserie). And 'kulich' is a type little cake made for Easter. Because there does not seem to be any actual catholicism or christianity in canon I decided to make kulich a spring thing instead. Genya liking kulich is actually cannon from the 3rd book! *pats self on back*
> 
> Anyways! Comments and kudos are always appreciated. They make my day and increase my typing speed. ;)
> 
> Until next time!!


	10. Graveyard Froyo

Alina was panicking. She had no idea how to respond to Aleksander’s invitation to dinner. Should she say yes? Or no? Quick! Think of a coffee pun!

_Coffee… coughing? Coffee fit? No, that’s completely dumb!_

_Latte… lot of… I have a latte of problems but you texting me isn’t one of them?_

Alina groaned. It was pointless. She only had a few minutes until Nikolai showed up for their not-date and she wanted to text now. A simple straightforward answer would just have to do. She gritted her teeth as she punched in her response.

<< That would be great. I’m busy this evening, but maybe tomorrow night?

_There, that wasn’t so bad. Boring, but normal._

She held the old phone in her hand and waited for a response. A few minutes passed, but nothing happened. She traced her fingers along the dark lines of her dying screen. What was she even doing? Why was she agreeing to go to dinner with a man who was so obviously out of her league that she couldn’t even afford to buy one of his shoes?

A loud knock at the door sent her scrambling. She quickly laced up her high top sneakers and threw on a warm jacket.

“Coming!” She called out as she shoved her phone and wallet into her jacket pocket. She threw open the door to find Nikolai standing on her porch.

“Coming so soon? My dear, at least let me buy you dinner first!” Nikolai said then smirked mischievously at her.

Alina spluttered, “That’s not what I meant and you know it!” She swatted at him, but he easily avoided her. Rolling her eyes, she told him to wait a minute while she locked the door. The process involved two sets of keys, both of which were prone to sticking in the lock.

After a fair amount of swearing, the ordeal was over and she turned around to find Nikolai standing with his arm outstretched. “It suffered a bit during the ride, but here.” He was offering a slightly squished yellow rose to her.

“Oh!” She breathed, accepting the rose from his fingers and bringing it to her nose. She gave it a tentative sniff and a rich floral scent filled her nose. “It’s lovely Nikolai! Yellow flowers are my favorite!”

He smiled warmly at her and Alina was struck with the sudden urge to sketch him. She imagined outlining his strong jawline, choosing the right shade of gold for his hair, and shading the soft edges of stubble on his cheeks. She wondered how she would texture his fitted jeans or sketch the lines of his leather jacket that fell over the slight folds of his light grey hoodie. Color pencils would probably be the best medium, but chalk pastels might also be nice.

“I know. I’ve heard you mention that to Alexei before.” His grin turned smug as he took in her appreciation of the gesture.

She tucked the rose into her jacket pocket then slid past him with a light hearted scowl. “Better watch out. If your head gets too big, you won’t be able to put on your helmet.”

He chuckled behind her as they descended the stairs and made their way to his motorcycle. Without prompting she grabbed the spare helmet off of the back of his bike and strapped it on. He made a show of pretending that his helmet was too small until she poked him in the side.

Once they were both on the motorcycle Alina placed her hands on his hips comfortably. It was only her third ride on the thing, but she felt like she was finally getting the hang of it. With a roar the bike jolted to life and they took off into the night. It was still terrifying and Alina griped him a bit too tight whenever they rounded a curve or went over a bump in the road, but overall the ride was pleasant. She found herself actually a bit sad to dismount once they reached the pizza shop.

“You’re going to love the pizza here! I swear it’s the best in-” Nikolai stopped so suddenly that Alina ran into his back.

“Nikolai, what… oh.” She looked over his shoulder to see that the pizza shop was closed. There was a little sign on it apologizing for the inconvenience and saying that they would reopen next week.

“Aw, that sucks.” He ran a hand through his hair, which should have messed it up but only added to his artfully disheveled look. “Do you want to try and find another place?”

Alina looked around as she considered. There were a couple other restaurants on the street, but none of them looked very appealing. Except…

“How do you feel about froyo?” She asked him excitedly as she pointed to a nearby shop. Alina couldn’t remember the last time she had it, but it was definitely among her favorite treats.

He shrugged. “I’ve never had it, but sure.”

“You’ve never had froyo?” The idea was mind boggling to Alina.

“Wait, is that the same thing as frozen yogurt?”

“Yes!”

“Then no.”

He laughed at her dejected expression then pressed a hand to the small of her back as he led her towards the shop. The point of contact was soft and warm. Alina knew that she should probably whack him away for being so familiar, but it felt nice so she let it be.

Entering the shop Nikolai’s eyes expanded as he took in the surroundings. Everything was decorated in bright pastels and there were pictures of froyo painted on the walls. Along the back there was a series of yogurt dispensers in a large variety of flavors and along the side wall was a toppings station.

One of the employees in a hot pink apron walked up and explained the process to them. Alina was familiar with it and she spaced off midway through to think about how grateful she was that their Ravkan Brew Aprons were plain black.

After the employee walked away, Alina sampled a couple of flavors, but Nikolai went straight for the first one. And then the one after that, and then after that, in fact he was putting a bit of every flavor into his cup.

“Ewww, Nikolai! That’s gross.” Alina crinkled her nose in disgust, but laughed.

“Don’t knock it till you try it! What are you going to pick?” He continued to work his way down the line.

“I’m trying to decide between white chocolate and cheesecake.” Alina said, licking each of the samples thoughtfully.

“You know you can pick both right?”

She rolled her eyes at him. “ _Of course_ I know that Mr. One-Hundred Flavors! It will taste better with just one though.” Deciding on cheesecake she went to fill her cup, making sure to leave extra room for the toppings.

Nikolai had moved on from the yogurt and was proceeding to add a bit of almost every single topping as well. She noticed that he skipped over the less sugary stuff like nuts or fruit and heaped on extra sour gummy worms. Alina skipped the candy toppings all together and made a beeline for the fruit.

“Boooooring!” Nikolai taunted as she ransacked the strawberries.

“Hey! Fruit is way more expensive than candy. I’m getting a great deal here!” She said as she piled almost all of the kiwi slices into her cup. One of the employees shot a dirty glare at her, but when they didn’t move to stop her, Alina proceeded to clean out the banana slices.

They both skipped over the brownie bites without comment.

When they were finally done they brought their cups up to be weighed. Nikolai reached into his pocket for his wallet, but Alina stopped him. “I owe you. It’s my turn to pay and I won’t be convinced otherwise.” She pushed her way in front of him to accentuate her point. He tried to protest and pointed out that his would be a lot more expensive than hers, but she waved him off.

His froyo ended up costing twice as much, but the total was still nowhere near the fifty dollars that she still owed him. She had gotten paid that morning, but it would be a while before she could pay back the loan comepletely.

They settled into some barstool seats at a high table. It was the farthest away from a horde of screaming kids that had entered after them. Alina thought she could hear one of the mothers complain that there weren’t any more blueberries and she smiled to herself.

“Well, at least you aren’t going to get scurvy.” Nikolai gestured to the pineapple in her cup with a spoon that was covered in froyo. It was grey from the sickening mixture of flavors.

“Don’t make me come after you and your froyo choices!”

“I have made an _experience_!” He insisted.

“A disgusting experience.”

They laughed and continued to mock each other’s frozen yogurt for a couple minutes. Nikolai coerced Alina into trying his concoction and she almost spit it out. He also tried to steal a piece of strawberry and would have suffered grievous injuries had Alina been wielding anything other than a plastic spoon.

They made small talk for a while until Alina asked him a question that had been on her mind for a few days. “Why a motorcycle?”

He flipped his bangs out of his eyes cockily. “I’ve heard that it gives me quite the roguish charm. And there is one lady I know who can’t keep her hands off of me when we’re on it!”

She swatted him on the arm, but there was no force behind it.

“Seriously though? I got it for a pretty dumb reason, just to piss my parents off.”

Alina tilted her head to encourage him to elaborate.

“They just have so many expectations for me, but no matter what I’ll never match up to the ideal son they want me to be.” He ran a hand through his hair and Alina was starting to realize that it was his nervous tell. “So I got the motorcycle in a very cliché form of rebellion. I hadn’t anticipated that I would love it as much as I do though.”

“What do they expect you to do?”

“Help run the family business.” He said grimly. “Which is fine, it’s just the way they want me to help. My parents do more of the managerial stuff and want me to start there, but I would rather work my way up from the bottom.”

Alina couldn’t stop herself from wondering what it must be like to have a family, even one that felt oppressive at times. But it never did any good to voice those types of wonders, unless she was with somebody like Mal. So she held the thought to herself and instead asked, “And what’s the family business?”

He paused for a moment and ran another hand through his hair. “Plumbing.”

She laughed. “I can’t imagine you as a plumber! Wait… So when you say you want to work your way up from the _bottom_...”

“Not literally!” He scrunched his face in mock disgust.

“Plumbing? Really? I still can’t see it.” Alina said honestly.

He shrugged. “What do your parents want you to be? Are they okay with you being an artist?”

 _Whoop there it is._ Alina thought to herself. This was always the difficult part of getting close to anybody, romantically or not. (And Alina still wasn’t sure if this was romantic.) She steeled herself for the wrench she was about to throw into their light conversation.

“I have no idea. They both died when I was little and I was raised in the foster care system.” She said it as matter of fact as she could, as if that would soften the blow.

Nikolai’s face became serious. “I didn’t know that. Thank you for telling me. I hope that talking about my family wasn’t uncomfortable for you.”

Her eyes went wide. He hadn’t said it. The classic ‘I’m sorry’ or any variation upon it. The words that she hated to hear because they were always filled with so much pity. Instead he had _thanked her_. Alina felt something in her chest clench and unclench simultaneously.

“No, it’s fine. I’m used to it.”

“Just because you’re used to it, doesn’t mean you have to be comfortable with it.”

Alina wasn’t sure what to say so she just shrugged.

“Is that how you met Mal?”

Another surprise. Usually people had no idea that Mal was a foster kid as well. He was just too damn charismatic for that. Again she found herself at a loss of what to say, they were so far off script it was almost comical. She nodded a little and looked at the melted remains of her yogurt.

They sat in silence for a little while until Nikolai gave an exaggerated sigh and pushed his empty cup away from himself. “Ugh, I’m so full. I feel positively sick!” He said it with a wide smile.

Alina was grateful for the change in topic. She was used to the conversation stalling after the big reveal, but it was usually because the other person didn’t know what to say, not her.

“Then why are you grinning like a lunatic?”

“It’s a good kind of hurt!” He winked at her. “Are you done too?”

She nodded and he collected their spoons and cups to throw away. They ambled out of the shop to go for a walk as Nikolai insisted that he wouldn’t be able to steer with such a full stomach. Their pace was slow and they walked close to each other, almost but not quite touching.

They went a couple of blocks before passing in front of a dance studio with large windows. A flurry of bodies and skirts caught her attention and Alina stopped. There was some sort of dance class going on and the students moved clumsily in pairs. It was absolutely adorable and Alina said so.

Suddenly she was whisked into Nikolai’s arms as he spun than dipped her. He started humming a frantic song that was horribly off key as he pushed and pulled her in a semblance of a dance. The shock must have been clear on her face and he chuckled. Alina retaliated with an ‘accidental’ step on his foot. This caused him to trip and they tumbled into a giggling heap on the sidewalk.

The front door of the studio opened and a sour looking woman stuck her head out. “No loiterers! You’re distracting my class!” Nikolai and Alina untangled themselves and ran off laughing. They didn’t slow down until they were back in front of the Nikolai’s motorcycle.

“For a plumber-barista you sure know how to dance,” Alina said.

Nikolai bowed with a dramatic flourish. “I am a man of many skills! Now, would you like to be escorted home, madam?”

Alina agreed and they fell into the increasingly familiar routine of putting on helmets and mounting the bike. She hung onto Nikolai’s hips loosely and at some points even felt comfortable letting go for a moment or two.

“I kind of miss when you were scared!” Nikolai shouted into the breeze. “The hugging was nice, even if it left an astounding array of bruises!”

“Don’t be an ass!” She yelled back.

“Can’t help it! Born that way!” He let out a deep whoop and she copied him.

All too soon, they pulled up to the house and dismounted. Nikolai insisted on walking her to the front door and she went through the equally arduous task of unlocking the door. When she was done she turned around.

He was standing close. Really close.

Nikolai hooked a strand of her hair behind her ear and Alina’s heart sped up. The night was quiet around them and her heart beat frantically in her ears.

“How has nobody snapped you up yet?” He asked her with wonder.

Alina’s voice came out breathy, but she was too engrossed to be embarrassed. “Because I snap back.”

“My point exactly.”

He leaned in and Alina tilted her face up to meet him. Their lips pressed together softly for a moment before he moved to pull away. It was a very chaste kiss.

It wasn’t enough.

Alina chased his lips and deepened the kiss. His lips were sweet like the gummy worms on his frozen yogurt. She moaned softly as he pulled her into him with one hand and tangled her hair with the other. Alina mirrored him, running a hand through his soft hair and along his lower back.

He backed her up to the door, pressing flush against her. She was acutely aware of the contrast of the cool door at her back to the warm body pressed to her front.

She had been kissed before, but it was never quite like this. Heat pooled in her stomach as they clutched at each other. She felt skin on skin as the hem of her shirt lifted slightly and his fingertips grazed her hip.

 _I wonder if this is how it would feel to kiss Mal._ The thought came to her unbidden. She tried to push it back, she didn’t want to be thinking about him right then.

But she couldn’t help it.

She thought of the rough stubble on Nikolai’s face and wondered if Mal’s would be rougher. Would his lips be as soft? Would he press a hand to the small of her back like that?

Guiltily she broke the kiss and rested her hands on his chest lightly. They were both breathing hard, fogging the air between them slightly.

She needed to tell him that she shouldn’t be doing this. Whatever this was now. She couldn’t pretend that it wasn’t romantic, but she also couldn’t be romantic with somebody if all she thought about was Mal. Alina opened her mouth to let him down gently, but he started before her.

“Alina, I need to tell you something.” This time when he worried a hand through his hair his face looked anxious as well. “I’m not-”

Nikolai was interrupted by the sound of a throat clearing behind them. They both jumped and Nikolai looked over his shoulder, but didn’t pull away from her. Alina had to rise to her toes to look over his shoulder.

Mal stood at the bottom of the stairs, his face thunderous. He opened his mouth to speak, but Alina didn’t let him.

“And where in the Saints have you been?” She called to him. It was the first thing that came to her mind after days of him not coming home or answering her texts.

Nikolai frowned at her reaction.

“Around.” Mal said shortly. “Now could you move? You’re blocking the door.”

“I don’t hear from you for _days_ and that’s all you have to say? _Around?_ ”

Nikolai stepped away from her, his hands dropping to his sides heavily. Alina was too focused on Mal to really notice.

He started up the stairs without replying.

“I was worried about you!” She insisted.

“Yeah, looks like it.” He sneered as he pulled open the door.

“What’s that supposed- Mal?!” He slammed the door behind him, cutting Alina off mid-sentence.

She growled in frustration.

What was going on with him? Why was he being such an ass? She had been ready to maybe forgive him for the previous night. She was at least going to hear him out, but now she wasn’t so sure.

“I guess I should get going.” Nikolai’s voice sounded softly from beside her, startling Alina out of her thoughts.

“Oh, I’m sorry Nikolai! I…” … _forgot that you were standing there._ She trailed off for a moment trying to remember what they were talking about before Mal interrupted them. “Were you about to tell me something?”

“Nah, it wasn’t anything important.” He waved her off with a smile.

“Oh, okay.” Her fingers tips beat a worried pattern on her thigh as they stood there in silence.

Nikolai stared at her, not making a move to say goodbye or leave.

The need to go talk to Mal pulled on her restlessly. “I really should go talk to him.” She gestured a vague hand in the direction of the house.

“Yeah, I guess you should.” He leaned in. For a hug or a kiss, Alina wasn’t sure. They fumbled a bit before settling into an incredibly awkward handshake.

“See you on Monday then.” He gave a little wave and smiled again, but it looked off to her. He descended the steps and Alina turned around to face the door.

The moment Alina grasped the handle, all thoughts of Nikolai left her. She was bracing herself for what waited in the house.

Words were about to be had.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :( Poor Nikolai! I know you guys asked me to be gentle but... has Alina _ever_ really been gentle in her life?  >.>
> 
> This chapter was totally inspired by me getting froyo the other day and wondering what flavors and toppings the characters would choose. I think Aleksander would probably also go for fruit like Alina but would get chocolate or coffee as the flavor. And nobody cares what Mal would want (okay fine... chocolate peanut butter froyo and corresponding toppings... happy? No. Me neither lol). I like to get at least two types of chocolate froyo, some chocolate candies, mochi, maraschino cherries, and hot fudge. I actually got my froyo FOR FREE last time! My boyfriend had some type of reward saved up that we didn't know about and it was the best thing ever.
> 
> As I post this chapter the next is currently in the outline process. There will be An Argument™ followed by fluffy Alarkling.  
> (ﾉ´ヮ`)ﾉ*: ･ﾟ
> 
> Anyways... kudos, comments ect. ect. You know my thirst! :P Hope you have a good day! See ya next time!


	11. He Just Wants One Thing

Alina stormed into the house, fuming and ready for a fight. All annoyances aside, she had been worried. Really worried. Mal hadn’t been home for days without letting her know where he was or when he would be coming back. And then he had waltzed back in with a curt response and terrible attitude?

It hurt.

Mal’s bedroom door was closed and she threw herself at it full force. She didn’t have the patience for knocking or for gentle pushing to unstick the door. Clinging to the door handle, she just barely managed to say upright as she swayed with leftover momentum.

“Saints! Alina, what the hell?” Mal jolted to a seated position on the bed, clutching a startled hand to his chest. His brow furrowed in annoyance and confusion.

 _Good. At least he looks how I feel._ She thought bitterly.

“I think that’s my line. What the hell Mal?”

His face soured and he flopped back down onto his pillow. “What?”

“Don’t ‘what?’ me! You know exactly _what_!” She rounded the bed to his side. “You’re gone for days without a word and when you get back you’re an absolute ass to me and my friend. What is wrong with you?”

He flipped on his side, facing away from her.

“Mal?” The word came out squeakier than Alina wanted it to. She was furious, but at the same time concern gnawed at her stomach. She had never seen him act this way before.

“Mal? Please talk to me. What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” He said the word into his pillow, not bothering to turn around.

“It has to be something.” She insisted, but he remained silent.

She tried again, “Please?”

Alina wanted to stay strong, to rail at him until he confessed, but insecurity wound tightly around her. In the past year or so they had drifted apart slowly despite her best efforts. But it had never been like this. Mal might not share everything with her or even try to meet her in the middle, but he had never pushed her away.

“Is it… Did I do something wrong?” Her voice was heavy with emotion.

Mal looked over his shoulder to find Alina struggling to hold back tears. He jerked back to a seated position. “No! Alina…” He swore under his breath and put his head in his hands. “Saints! Maybe. I don’t know.”

“What do you mean you don’t know?”

“It means I _don’t know_!” He snapped at her and Alina staggered back like she had been hit. Mal’s eyes tightened at her reaction and he seemed to deflate in front of her. “I’m sorry. He just…” His fist tightened. “Pisses me off so much.”

Alina blinked in confusion. What was Mal even talking about? She wracked her brain.

Oh.

_Oh._

“Nikolai?”

His knuckles paled with tension. “Yes.”

“Why?”

“He’s a bad influence.” Mal said darkly. “Don’t try to pretend he isn’t. You’ve been dressing differently, riding on his damn bike… Saints! You even let him sleep over.”

It felt like a cold bucket of water had been dumped over her head. She paced her next words slowly and carefully. “And what’s wrong with that?”

Mal seemed to realize that he was walking in dangerous territory and he huffed a ‘nothing’ then seemed to reconsider. “I guess… do you have to be so flagrant about it?”

Alina’s laugh came out hard and stony. “That’s rich coming from you.”

“What?”

“I’ve caught you and Zoya naked in the living room more times than I can count!”

She actually knew the exact number (five times), but really once was more than enough to traumatize her for life.

“That’s different,” he sulked.

Alina was about to open her mouth to protest when her phone buzzed. She pulled it out of her pocket, ignoring Mal’s glare.

Aleksander  
>> Unfortunately I’m busy tomorrow night.

Not caring that it was rude, Alina responded back immediately.  
<< I’m working evening shifts Monday-Thursday. Next Friday or Saturday?

“Who was that?” He asked.

“Nobody,” she hedged.

“It was Nikolai, wasn’t it? You know he just wants one thing.”

Alina stewed and clenched her teeth hard enough that they ached. They had made it back to the dangerous territory. Mal had tried to backtrack before, but he wasn’t so smart this time. She asked him what he meant.

“You know,” he insisted.

“No I don’t.”

“Sex! He just wants sex from you!” He was yelling now and his hands flew up around him angrily.

“Because that’s all I’m good for, right?” Alina’s voiced had raised as well. She wasn’t sure when it had shifted, but it was ringing in her ears. “I’m just a body to use up? I thought you thought more of me.” The words felt like they were being ripped from her chest.

“Of course I think more of you! How could you say that? It’s _him_ ,” Mal practically spat the word, “that I don’t trust. I’m just trying to look out for you!”

“Don’t.” She snapped. “I can handle myself.”

Her phone buzzed again before Mal could respond. It was still clutched in her hand and she flipped it over to read the message.

Aleksander  
>> Sooner. We could do something other than dinner. I’m planning on going for a walk with Volcra and Vo’ya tomorrow morning, join me?

“See! He’s so desperate for it that he can’t go more than a few minutes without texting you!”

Alina shoved the phone in her pocket. “It’s not him.”

“Who is it then? You wouldn’t be texting Alexei or Genya at time like this.”

“Somebody else.” She didn’t want to tell Mal, he didn’t deserve to know. He lost that right when he started flinging his insinuations around.

“Who then? Who could it possibly be?” He said it like there was no one else in the world who would want to text her. Alina had never been as sociable or popular as Mal. She rarely texted or called people either, but that didn’t mean that she was some kind asocial freak.

“Another guy who is just _desperate_ for my virgin body!” She spat. “I actually have a whole group of them in a bidding war for my attention because they are just. that. _desperate!_ ”

A funny look passed over Mal’s face that Alina couldn’t quite place. His voice was hollow. “That’s not what I meant and you know it.”

“What did you mean, Mal? That if it’s not Mikhael or Dubrov harassing me then it isn’t okay?”

His arms crossed defensively. “They’re just joking around.”

Alina’s heart caught in her throat painfully. He didn’t see it. He still didn’t see how much he was hurting her.

All of the careless shrugs, excuses, absences, and insensitive words that Mal had dealt her in the last year seemed to swell up within in her. She was a dam about to break and flood everything in its path. Her fingers curled into her hands and she could feel the sharp indent of each fingernail in her palms.

“Go to hell, Mal.”

Alina had been aiming for a shout. Something loud enough to cave in the already crumbling walls and blow off the leaking roof. She wanted her voice to be heard. Not just by Mal in the confines of his room, but by the neighbors, the country, the continent, the whole world.

She wanted her words to be more than heard. They should be seen and felt and considered.

Instead her voice was no more than a broken whisper.

She turned on her heel and ran for her room. She slammed the door behind herself and sunk to the floor in a heap. The tears had finally come and they were flowing with a vengeance.

The room felt like it was shaking. Earthquake? She pressed a hand to the floor. It didn’t move and Alina realized that she must be the one who was shaking. With anger or grief, she wasn’t sure. She hugged her arms around her torso and pressed her face into the cradle they made.

Some unmarked amount of time passed until the sounds of Mal moving around filled the house. The walls were so thin and the floor’s creaks so familiar that Alina could practically picture him as he traveled from his bedroom to the kitchen and then out the front door. It slammed behind him and the locks shuffled closed.

A part of Alina had been hoping that he would come to her. She knew the Mal of her childhood memories would have. With a freshly picked dandelion or buttercup in hand, he would have hugged Alina tightly until the tears stopped and the shaking calmed. It wouldn’t have mattered who had caused the upset, he would have been the first to apologize and offer consolation.

The thought sparked a memory and Alina reached into her coat pocket. She pulled out the forgotten rose that Nikolai had given her. It felt like days ago, not hours. The flower was more crumpled than before and the petals had started to brown, but when she brought it to her nose it’s floral scent comforted her.

‘ _He just wants sex._ ’ The words grated across her mind. She crushed the flower in her hand then threw it across the room. She pulled out her phone and opened her and Nikolai’s conversation. The smiling emoji’s, that she still didn’t know how he made, now seemed menacing.

She closed the conversation and looked at the other names in her phone. Alina needed to reach out to someone right now who wasn’t Mal or Nikolai. She thought of texting Genya or Alexei, but she felt like she knew what they would say.

‘ _Mal’s an ass! Don’t believe him! You deserve so much more! Nikolai’s great! You can trust him! Ect. ect._ ’

 Alina didn’t want to hear it, didn’t want to deal with it. She found herself opening the conversation with Aleksander. His intentions were still unclear, but at least he didn’t know anyone else in her life. He was separate, isolated, distinct.

Her fingers started typing and she didn’t stop them.  
<< Tomorrow morning sounds great, when and where?

>> 8 AM, Tsentral Park, the bench where you did the chibi thing?

Alina laughed wetly at his use of the word ‘chibi.’  
<< Sounds good. I’ll see you and the pups then.

>> Perfect.

She started to get ready for bed, wanting to get the day officially over with, when he texted her again.

>> I’m really glad my text made it through this time.

Alina smiled at the cracked and faded screen.  
<< Me too. Goodnight Aleksander

>> Goodnight Alina

She fell asleep holding her phone.

~ ~ ~ ~

The next morning Alina rubbed an ice cube over her puffy, tired eyes in a futile attempt to lessen the swelling. When she had been texting Aleksander last night she hadn’t taken into account how bad her eyes could look after a night of crying. She let the ice completely melt over her face, not caring if it ran into her hair. She was going to take a shower anyways.

It was her turn to pay for the electricity that month so she didn’t want to waste any money heating the water. It was Mal’s turn to pay for the water so she made sure that the chilling water was on full blast.

She didn’t let herself ease into the cold stream of water. Instead she threw herself into the shower with a blood curdling screech. The moment the water hit her naked body she found herself doubting every life decision in her life that had culminated to that moment. However, she found the strength to push through and even lingered towards the the end once the water had numbed her through.

After the shower she paid close attention to blow drying her hair. If she did it just right she could breathe some volume into her lanky locks. Alina’s hair was stick straight and nothing she _or Genya_ did could ever change that for more than a couple of hours, to which Genya took grave personal offence.

Once she was at least partially satisfied with the look she retreated to her room to throw on a simple dark grey shirt dress that she had managed to practically steal for five dollars and pair of plain black leggings. When she looked at herself in the mirror she didn’t totally hate her reflection. Sure, all of her flaws were still there and she was kicking herself for never accepting any of the makeup supplies that Genya offered her, but for some reason she felt… almost acceptable. Maybe it was just the morning light collecting in her little room.

 _Don’t be silly and stop ogling yourself in the mirror._ She instructed herself before grabbing her favorite light blue scarf and thrusting her feet into the high-tops she wore the night before. Grabbing a couple of reusable grocery bags she made her way out of the house.

Mal still hadn’t gone grocery shopping and Alina’s rumbling stomach was the proof of that. She was just going to have to hold out until she could make it to the store after he walk with Aleksander.

_Stupid stomach. Stupid Mal. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid._

_…Stupid Alina._

What was she even doing? Going on a date with a man who was even more painfully out of her league than Mal?

_‘He just wants sex.’_

The words were like poison in her veins. She tried to fight against them, use any of the confidence that she had almost felt looking in the mirror, but it was so hard.

 _Get out of my head, Mal!_ She screamed in her mind.

_Just. GET OU-_

“Alina? Where are you going?”

Alina jerked back to reality. She had been so caught up in her head that she hadn’t even noticed that she had made it to the park or that she had completely passed Aleksander. He was sitting on a bench with one leg casually slung over the other. Volcra and Vo’ya were panting patiently on the ground next to him.

She walked backwards to join him and almost tripped in the process.

“Elegant as always,” he said with a smirk. Alina might have taken offence, but his tone was light and open with no hint of malice. “Going grocery shopping afterwards?” He gestured to the bag looped in her arm.

She just nodded nervously.

He was wearing casual clothes instead of his usual suit or button up shirt and it made her heart thump uncomfortably. Nobody should look that good in jeans and a black sweatshirt. It was truly criminal. Somebody should lock him up.

Preferably Alina.

She gave an awkward squeak of a laughter at her own thoughts. Then, realizing that she was most likely coming off as a lunatic, she tried to turn the laugh into a cough. “Ah, yes. Good morning.”

“Good morning.” The smirk remained on his face in full force and she wondered if he ever truly smiled. It was probably better if he didn’t, otherwise he’d leave a wake of dead bodies in his path, charmed to death by his smile.

Avoiding his gaze, she squatted down to greet Volcra and Vo’ya.

“Hello babies!” She cooed as they jumped on her, licking and demanding pets. Her fingers twined in their soft, inky black fur and Alina felt she could spend a lifetime like that.

“I’ve never seen them take to somebody so fast, even me.”

She glanced up to see him staring down at her with slightly jealous downturn to his mouth. Laughing, she scooped a dog under each arm. “We are kindred spirits! They are mine now.”

She tried to pick them up, but Vo’ya was nearly half her size and too heavy to lift. That would mean she could only run off with Volcra and that would just be unfair. She said as much to Aleksander and he gave a little chuckle.

“Well if you aren’t going to steal my dogs we might as well start walking.”

He got up from the bench and handed Volcra’s leash to Alina. She took it gladly.

“So…” She searched for a good conversational topic. “Why the names Volcra and Vo’ya?”

“They’re from old Ravkan lore. The Volcra and the Nichevo’ya were said to be terrible shadow creatures. Absolutely unstoppable, human-devouring, soulless monsters.” His free hand became animated. “They despised darkness and breed in the shadows. Some say that they could be defeated with sunlight, others say that they were indestructible. Fascinating stuff, really.” The excitement shone in his eyes and flushed his cheeks slightly.

Alina gave him a measured look. “You are kind of a nerd aren’t you?”

He huffed a short laugh. “I guess. Better than a klutz though, right?” His elbow bumped her affectionately and Alina thought she might spontaneously combust from the contact. She was having a hard time remembering how to walk or breath, let alone talk.

He continued. “I’ve shortened Nichevo’ya to just ‘Vo’ya’ both for the alliteration and the fact that anything longer than three syllables is too much for a dog’s name.”

This was good. He was actually talking instead of waiting patiently through Alina’s ramblings. “You said that they’re different breeds? But they look so similar! Volcra looks like a teacup version of Vo’ya. I could just eat her up!”

The two dogs kept cocking their head and looking back at Alina and Aleksander in confusion whenever they said their names.

“Yes, a Schipperke and Groenendael, they are completely unrelated breeds, but they do look quite similar. Vo’ya is a type of sheep dog, which drives Volcra crazy with all the herding.” He chuckled again and it was quickly becoming one of Alina’s favorite sounds.

“Did you purposefully get Vo’ya because she’s a larger version of Volcra?”

He was quiet for a moment. “No…”

Then, “Yes.” He admitted.

Alina laughed and Aleksander tried to frown, but ended up smiling anyways. Correction, smirking.

“You seem to really likes dogs. Why don’t you have any?”

She shrugged. “Just never really worked out.”

“Parents never let you have one?”

“Something like that,” she hedged, not wanting to go down the conversational rabbit hole that was talking about her foster care experience.

Seeming to notice that she didn’t want to elaborate, he changed the subject. They talked a little about anything and everything, the conversation flowing freely between them. He was surprisingly easy to talk to once Alina got over some of her nerves.

The leaves were starting to turn in the Autumn weather and some drifted lazily to the ground. The dogs jumped and snapped at them as they fell, causing both their owner and his date to laugh. It was an unseasonably warm day and Alina loosened the scarf around her neck.

“I like that color on you.” Aleksander noted. “Although, I bet you’d look even better in black.”

Alina rolled her eyes. They had been discussing his almost entirely black wardrobe just a few topics ago. “Like I said, not all of us can look so good in black!” She gestured at him then at herself. “It just makes me look pasty.”

“Oh, I doubt that.” His voice was cut through with insinuation and Alina wasn’t completely sure what they were talking about anymore. She gave another awkward cough and changed the subject.

“So, the gallery… what’s that about?” She said lamely.

He smirked as if knowing that she had just chickened out of some obvious flirting. “Well I mostly use it as a way to showcase my art, but it’s a large enough space that I can usually fit a few other collections as well.”

Alina blinked. Of course he was an artist as well and not just a gallery owner. She tried not to act too surprised. “Which series was yours?”

“The ones you were standing- or I guess _sitting_ \- in front of.”

The pitch black paintings with details almost too faint to see, but made all the more fascinating for it. “Oh! I loved those! My favorite was the pair of hands.”

He looped their free hands together and held them up to mimic the pose in the painting. “Like this?” His voice sent shivers down her spine. “I’m impressed; most people aren’t able to tell what that one is.”

She looked at his long fingers tangled in hers. They had stopped walking, but Alina felt like her voice had kept walking off without her. He ran his thumb along the side of her palm, which didn’t help her mute situation.

“There is something I should tell you though. The gallery is more of a pet project than anything else.”

Alina cocked her head in interest, trying to ignore the slow burning pattern his thumb worked against her skin.

“I work as the CMO of the Ravkan Brew.”

Alina jumped back, almost trampling Volcra in the process. “What?!” She really hoped that he was joking, but he didn’t seem the type to joke about something like that.

“CMO stands for ‘chief marketing officer.’” He said calmly, misinterpreting her outcry as request for clarification rather than an expression of disbelief.

“I know what it stands for.” She snapped then covered her mouth with a sudden horrifying realization. If he was the CMO then he was pretty much her boss twenty times over. And here she was snapping at him and… _Oh Saints. I told him I was hungover at work! I’m going to get fired! Oh crap._

“I should get going!” She said and took off in a random direction. She was rushing away, but his long legs easily caught up to her panicked stride.

“Alina, I think you’re forgetting something.”

She ignored him and he stopped following her. For a moment Alina thought she had gotten away. Then he spoke.

“Volcra, heel.”

The leash Alina had forgotten she was holding suddenly snapped with tension. Volcra obediently plopped down on the ground, anchoring her in place.

“Volcra, come.”

The dog hopped back up and started bounding towards her owner, tugging Alina along behind her. Despite her toy size, Volcra was a powerhouse of a dog and Alina couldn’t do anything to stop their progress back to the man.

“Wow, you weren’t kidding when you said that you would steal my dog.” He smirked.

Alina offered up the leash to him guiltily so that she would be free to escape. He didn’t accept it. “Alina, it’s not like I can fire you and even if I wanted too, which I don’t, that doesn’t fall under my jurisdiction.”

She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Of course it fell under his ‘jurisdiction.’ _What an ass,_ she thought, but she took a politer approach.

“If you have a three letter acronym starting with C for chief as your title, I’m pretty sure that you could fire me in an instant. You probably wouldn’t understand this with your nice suites and posh car and purebred pups, but I’m barely making ends meet with two jobs as is. I can’t afford to lose this job… literally.”

He looked at her with a sort of appreciation, but it only made Alina’s blood boil more. “What in the Saints are you even doing here with me? My phone is a piece of shit, these sneakers are one of only four pairs of shoes that I own, and my dress cost me $5.”

Aleksander didn’t say anything so she continued. “I’ve never had more than fifty dollars at the end of a month, never driven a car let alone _own_ one, and my diet mostly consists of free day old croissants!”

“Are you finished?” He asked her calmly.

“No!” She exclaimed then paused searching for more. But nothing hopped immediately to mind and he looked like he was about to speak. In a panic she blurted out, “I used to be a foster kid!”

 _I need a shovel to knock him out then bury myself in the ground with before he comes to._ What was with her admitting to being a foster kid twice in past 24 hours? What was happening to her?

Aleksander waited a bit longer to make sure that she was in fact finished. “I don’t care about any of that stuff. Or, at least, it doesn’t make me think any less of you. This may be hard for you to believe, but I didn’t grow up with money. I was raised by a single mother who worked two jobs on top of going to college. My daycare was a local playground and my birthday present was always a pair of new socks.”

Alina stared at him in shock, the guilt of prejudice worming its way through her stomach.

“Come here,” he said softly, grabbing her hand. “I don’t know what you think a CMO does, but it’s really just the creative side of the company. I control and construct the image of the Ravkan Brew, not the inner workings.”

He paused for a second, seeming to consider something. “Well, sometimes I have some control over the inner workings. The CEO is a complete child and I have to step in to do is job half the time.” His tone turned bitter. “But Mr. Lantsov always has the final say over any of the actions I take anyways.”

It was completely ridiculous and vain of her, but Alina was having a hard time comprehending what he was saying with her hand in his. She tried to focus on the sensation of both the dogs, who were leaning against her legs now. “But, you… you were getting coffee like an intern!”

Aleksander’s face hardened. “Yes, that would be an example of Mr. Lantsov’s immaturity. I was his personal assistant years ago, but he continues to insist that I’m the only one who can be trusted to get coffee for the board meetings.”

He stared at her for a long moment. “Look, I’m not going to try and convince you to trust me. Whether you do or not is up to you.” He squeezed her hand in his softly. “But, I for one, would enjoy getting dinner with you this Friday, my treat.”

Alina felt like she was standing on a precipice, about to either tumble into the unknown or stumble back to the familiar dullness of her life. She thought of the way Mal had treated her last night like she was trash and of the way Nikolai had asked her “what are you going to do next” like she had all the possibilities in the world.

She squeezed Aleksander’s hand back. “Okay.”

He smirked in a way that made Alina doubt that he ever thought that she would say no. “Perfect. I have just the place in mind. I’ll text you the details.”

He let go of her hand to glance at an expensive gold watch on his wrist and frowned. “I should get going. I have a business meeting in a few hours and I need to drop off the dogs and change first.”

Alina tried not to let disappointment fall on her face. “Oh, okay.”

She gave up Volcra’s leash and he called both dogs to him with a low whistle. They had wandered the few feet that their leashes allowed and now came bounding back. Like streaks of black lightning they ran quick circles around Aleksander and Alina dragging them closer together.

Alina gasped a laugh. “Did you teach them that?” She asked in disbelief.

“And if I did?” One of his eyebrows quirked and she was painfully aware of just how close his smirking lips were in relation to hers.

Vo’ya shifted a little causing Alina to sway precariously until she felt a warm hand on her back.

Aleksander leaned in gradually, but deliberately. Making his intentions clear, but still giving Alina a chance to bow out.

That was the last thing she wanted to do.

She started to raise to her toes to meet him, but then both the dogs shifted and even Aleksander’s added support couldn’t keep her upright this time. She landed on the ground with a yelp and a loud thump. Both their legs had been completely tangled in a web of leashes, but Alina’s were particularly stuck.

She blushed furiously, trying to untangle herself while avoiding his gaze. The sound of a restrained chuckle filled her ears and she looked up. Aleksander’s face was impassive, but his eyes gave away his amusement.

Alina couldn’t help herself. She burst out laughing which caused Volcra and Vo’ya to jump on her excitedly. It felt like she should maybe be mad at them for tripping her and ruining her almost kiss, but she couldn’t bear to even fake a scowl. She let them cover her with kisses instead and Aleksander leaned down to untangle them.

Once he was done and had pulled both dogs off of her he helped her up. “You are a walking disaster.”

She grinned at him. “Not really, I spend more time on my ass than walking.”

He laughed openly and Alina thought she caught a glimpse of his full smile. Giving her hand a final squeeze he promised to text her before walking off with his two black shadows.

She stood in place, staring after his back as he left. Right before he rounded a corner, his hand lifted in a wave, like he knew that she was still following him with her eyes.

With a smile she turned in the direction of the bargain supermarket nearby. Alina realized that the entire time that she had almost kissed Aleksander, she hadn’t thought about Mal at all.

_Praise the Saints for small victories._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay! Another chapter! This one took longer than I thought because it was about 1.5 x longer than usual! I could have separated the argument from the date, but it wasn't really long enough to stand on its own.
> 
> I hope you guys liked the Alarkling fluff! I'm still dying over how cute Volcra and Vo'ya would be. Here is the [reference pic](https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/c7/45/c6/c745c6973eab049345294d66cfabde52.jpg) that I'm using.  We are also starting to move a bit more into the arching plot of the story. (Oh my!) And I'm really excited for the extra helpings of drama that will bring. ;)
> 
> Anyways! Comments are lovely. :P Feel free to let me know if there is anything in particular you want to see and I might be able to work it in. ;) Oh, and I'm also considering getting a little bit smuttier and bumping the rating up to Mature. Still on the fence though, so let me know. <(￣︶￣)>
> 
> Until next time!!


	12. Come Home ASAP

Alina had suffered through a grueling walk to get to work on Monday. An unexpected windstorm was working its way through Os Alta, wreaking havoc as it went. Alina probably shouldn’t have even ventured out of the house, but she was scheduled to open that morning and she wasn’t about to lose even a few hours of pay.

It was lucky that the wind was blowing towards the Brew. Otherwise she might never have made it. As is, she looked like she had been sucked into a vacuum then spat back out on the doorstep of the café. Her hair was matted in a way that would take a good twenty minutes to undo by brush and the best she could do right then was to finger comb it and push it back into a very messy bun.

Despite that and the slight squelching noise her puddle soaked shoes made whenever she moved, Alina was in an uncharacteristically good mood. She smiled at the equally windswept customers, made silly small talk about the weather (“Wind! Am I right?!”), and drew doodles on anything she could get her hands on. Cups, receipts, pastry bags, and even the back of Alexei’s hand; nothing that was within reach was safe from her permanent marker.

“Somebody’s cheery,” Alexei grumbled as he rubbed at painful looking red welt on the back of his neck. On his way to work it seemed that the wind had decided to smack him upside the head with a particularly callous tree branch.

Alina just smiled blithely as she doodled a falling leaf on a 12 ounce macchiato. She was still high on her date from Saturday and if she focused hard enough she thought that she could still feel the warm press of his Aleksander’s against her back as they both leaned in for a kiss.

She sighed dreamily as she foamed milk and wondered what his lips would have felt like if they had the chance to graze her own.

“Alina? Alina!!” A frantic shout from Alexei shook her from her daydreams and she realized that she was spilling foam all over the counter. _Whoops._

“Gah, you’re worse than Nikolai today!” Alexei gave her a despairing look as she mopped up the spilled milk and her smile faltered a bit. It was very lucky that Nikolai wasn’t able to make it to work today due to the wind, because Alina wasn’t ready to talk with him.

She wasn’t even sure what she was going to say. _Thank you so much for kissing me, Nikolai? It was probably the best kiss I’ve ever had, but I couldn’t stop thinking about my roommate/childhood-friend/unrequited love during it. But he’s being a complete ass and I have no idea why? Also, I might maybe be wanting to kiss a certain gallery owner/CMO of the Ravkan Brew and I have a date with him this Friday. So could we maybe hold off on the romance and just stay friends until I figure everything else out?? Please and thank you!_

Alina was pretty sure that wouldn’t go over so well.

The usually gentle tingle of bells sounding as the front door opened were made harsh by the fluctuating breeze as a trio of customers walked in. Alina looked up and had to resist a moan.

It was Zoya, followed by two of her evil little minions, Nadia and Marie who looked like little knock offs of their queen bee. All of them were wearing fluffy scarves and cardigans over their designer leggings which tucked into their weird slipper boots. They sauntered over, practically in unison, with Zoya taking the lead. Alina almost wondered if they were about to break out into a song and dance.

Zoya smoothed a hand over her luxurious black hair, restoring it to near perfection. It was like she had her own weather system around her head. Unlike everybody else, her friends included, she hardly looked touched by the wind. Alina self-consciously raised a hand to her matted hair. It just wasn’t fair.

Without greeting or any sort of acknowledgement that she knew Alina outside of work, Zoya launched into her order. “Give me a 16 ounce Firebird latte with extra foam and a slice of honeyed fig bread, a _fresh_ slice. And don’t you dare spell my name wrong again, Starkov.”

Alina’s eyes ached from resisting an eye roll. There were just so many annoying things Zoya had managed to fit into her order, the primary being that there was no such thing as a Firebird latte.

“Did you mean a Firebird Frappucino?” Alina tried to keep as much of her annoyance out of the sentence as she could.

Zoya gave an exasperated huff. “Did I stutter?”

“No, there just isn’t-”

“I want to talk to the manager.” Zoya cut off Alina sharply.

“I’m sorry, but as you know,” _from asking for the manager every damn time you come in_ , “the Ravkan Brew has a rotating store manager and he isn’t at this location right now. I am the assistant manager, but I can relay a message to the manager or you can write down a complaint to add to the suggestions box.” Alina didn’t even bother to gesture to it, Zoya knew exactly where it was.

Zoya narrowed her sharp blue eyes. “Just make my order, Starkov. Or is that too much to ask?”

Alina wanted to point out that her request actually was too much to ask, as she wanted an off menu drink, but instead Alina plastered on her best I-hate-you-but-I-can’t-lose-this-job-so-let’s-just-get-this-over-with smile and wrote down the order on a cup. Zoya insisted on making sure her name was spelled correctly before she paid. Afterwards Nadia and Marie place their order in an equally hostile manner.

Once the women were out of sight Alina trashed the disposable cup with Zoya’s correctly spelled name on it and made another one like she always did. Usually she would just slightly misspell Zoya’s name like ‘Zoyo’ or ‘Zoia.’ But she was feeling extra feisty today, so she put down a completely different name.

After her small act of defiance, she set to making the previously imaginary drink. She stirred the mango and strawberry mix with the grapefruit syrup in the cup then topped the nauseating concoction off with milk. After steaming it longer than usual to create extra foam, she topped it with the carbonated candy dust.

“Firebird latte?” Alina let every word drip with distain as she placed the drink on the counter.

Zoya sauntered then inspected the cup. “What the fuck is this? This isn’t even a name.”

She twisted the cup towards Alina displaying the letters Zzyzx in bold handwriting and Alina furrowed her brow in mock confusion and innocence. “Oh, that’s a real name, isn’t it the right one?”

Alina had found the name it on a baby names website when looking for names starting with a ‘Z.’ She made sure to have a couple on hand every week, just for when Zoya graced the Ravkan Brew with her gorgeous presence. Some of her past favorites included Zelda, Zuri, Zoro, and Zsuzsanna, just to name a few.

Zoya snapped a ‘whatever’ before storming off to join her friends.

“Saints. She is such a bitch!” Alina heard Zoya mock whisper. _Right back at you,_ she thought before moving to wipe down the espresso machine. Alexei shot her a sympathetic look, but didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to; it was enough for Alina to know that she had a witness to Zoya’s fuckery.

As she continued to tidy up, Alina tried to ignore their conversation by daydreaming about Aleksander again, but her interest was piqued when she heard Mal’s name.

“You kicked him out?” Nadia asked Zoya with what sounded like horror, but when Alina risked a quick glance she looked more elated than scandalized.

Zoya’s lowered her voice and Alina could just barely make it out. “He kept going on and on about her and that other barista. You know the really hot one?”

“The one with blond hair?” Marie interjected loudly and was shushed before Zoya continued.

“Yeah, she came home with him one night wearing his jacket and Mal lost it. I’ve never seen him so mad. He hardly listened to a word I said, it was so annoying.”

Alina wasn’t quite sure what they were talking about, but she had to hear more. She moved slowly towards the end of the counter then pretended to sort the straws.

“That was a while ago though. It was on Friday that I kicked him out. They had some sort of argument and it was all he wanted to talk about.”

From the corner of her eye Alina could see Nadia lean towards Zoya. “So what did you do?”

Zoya gave a heavy sigh. “I said ‘If you’re so jealous of Nikolai why don’t you just fuck her already?’ I was being sarcastic though! But he got all defensive and I realized that he actually _was_ jealous. It was awful.”

A deep feeling of unease washed over Alina as Nadia and Marie both repeated ‘so awful’ in tones that sounded suspiciously gleeful.

“You really think Mal wants to get with Alina?”

Alina head jerked up, horrified. Wait. They had been talking about her?

The context was obvious now and there was no other explanation, but she still couldn’t quite believe that they could have possibly been talking about her. Alina knew that Mal hated Nikolai, but did he hate him because he actually wanted her?

No. Her couldn’t. He he had always been clear that he thought of her like a sister, no matter how much Alina didn’t think of him like a brother. Achingly clear.

She was gaping openly at them now, but they still didn’t notice. Zoya nodded solemnly as she said, “That’s why I kicked him out. I’m not anybody’s second helping.” Nadia and Marie’s eyes flickered to each other for a brief unconvinced second before fervently nodding their heads and agreeing with her.

The conversation quickly drifted away to other topics, something about a band they were thinking of making called the Etherealki, but Alina continued to stand frozen in place. It felt like hours before she finally moved, called over by a costumer, but it was probably only a few minutes.

Alina’s mind continued to race throughout the day, causing her to be even more spacey than before. Alexei kept shooting her worried looks, but for once didn’t say anything. The hours of the day seemed to bleed and blur together. All she knew was at some point she was at the Brew, then she was working next to Genya at the boutique and then then she was on her way home.

The wind had picked up even more and she was fighting it all the way home. It was raining now too. All in all, quite the miserable combination, but one that did manage to take her mind off of things. She had finally made it to her house and was walking up the front lawn when she noticed something was off.

One of the trees by her house swayed precariously in the wind. She had never seen it lean so far and wondered when it would snap back up.

But it didn’t. It just kept _leaning_ until she couldn’t see it behind the house anymore and there was a deep crashing sound.

Alina bolted to the side of the house to inspect the damage. The lone pine tree had fallen into the window of Mal’s room. She immediately tried to push and pull it away from the house, but it was no use. Hot sweat started to mix with cold persistent rain and her hands grew sticky with sharp smelling sap.

After a few futile minutes of manhandling the tree she gave up. There was no way she was going to be able to move it herself. As much as she loathed the idea she was going to have to call Mal.

She hurried into the house and pressed the 1 key to speed dial Mal. Alina rarely called anybody, even Mal. Her phone was so old that it would drop calls nine times out of ten and people often complained that she sounded like she was in a tunnel. So she only ever texted if she could help it, saving the sketchy phone calls for emergency situations. Mal knew that and had always picked up the phone when Alina called no matter what. But Mal didn’t pick up the phone this time.

Alina tried again and still no answer. Maybe it was just poor service during the storm. She tried a third time and when she didn’t get a response she fired a quick text to Mal.

<< Tree fell into house. Come home ASAP

She paused for a second after sending it, hoping that he would respond. He didn’t and she set down her phone on the kitchen table with more force than was necessary. There wasn’t time to wait around for him. When she had been trying to move the tree she had seen that there was water coming into the house through the broken window and that was the more pressing matter.

Mal’s bedroom door was, thankfully, already open and she went inside to inspect the damage. A good three feet of treetop stuck into the room through the window at an awkward angle. The floor underneath it was littered with pine needles and broken glass stuck together with oozing sap. She could hear the shrill screech of the wind as it worked its way around the tree and into the room, blowing water in with it.

Mal’s bed was starting to become soaked with a wet stain of water creeping its way towards his laptop which he had left on his bed. Alina sprinted over to grab it then placed it in the kitchen for safe keeping. She grabbed a couple more valuables out of the room including the painting she had made for him and for once she was thankful for his Spartan room, as it only took a few trips to move the majority of his stuff out of the splash zone.

Now that the valuables were out of the way she had to stop the water from spreading to the rest of the house. Grabbing all of the towels from the bathroom floor, where they somehow always inexplicably ended up instead of on the rack, she lined Mal’s doorway creating a make-shift barrier.

It probably wasn’t going to help much, but at least it was something, right? Alina’s mind was spiraling with panic. She didn’t know what to do next or how to fix the situation. This was her home. _Their_ home. And it was being damaged before her eyes. She felt so weak and helpless.

She felt like she was five years old waiting in the social services office for somebody to notice that she was crying in the corner instead of playing with the dumpy doll they handed her.

And she _hated_ it.

She refused to be dependent, always relying on Mal. So she shook herself and went to the window for a closer look at the damage. The top tree of the was much skinnier than the base, so maybe she could push it out then cover the hole with something. Her hands wrapped around rough bark and sharp needles, but she ignored the pain and pushed.

It hardly moved.

The panic started to creep its way back in, but Alina pushed it back down. She changed her position to get more leverage and tried again. Then again and again. Finally, the tree started to shift with each push and she continued frantically until it finally cleared the window and scraped against the house sickeningly. It had taken so much effort that Alina wanted to fall to the ground where she stood, broken glass be dammed.

But the rain was pouring into the room even more insistently now that the tree was no longer blocking the window. Alina scrounged up a large tarp and a warped piece of plywood. Then she set outside with a ridiculously heavy tool box that she though belonged to Mal, but wasn’t sure.

It was torture and took much longer than it probably should have, but Alina managed to hammer the plywood over the window and then the tarp over that. It had felt like she was in a carwash, she was pretty sure she had lost a shoe to the mud, and the tarp almost flew away three times, but she did it.

“Alina?!” Mal came bolting around the house with panic in his eyes. He took in her bedraggled form, soaked through and caked with mud up to her ears, and heaved a huge sigh of relief. “Thank the Saints, you’re alright!”

“Why wouldn’t I be alright?” She asked him, exhaustion dulling her mind.

“You called me three times then texted me to say a tree fell into the house and to come home as soon as I could!”

“Yeah, _the house_. Not me.” Her response came out sharp and peevish, but she couldn’t help it. She was cold, wet, and exhausted. Not wanting to spend second longer outside she started walking towards the front door.

“How could I know that?”

“By picking up the phone, Asshole!” He was slightly blocking the path and she twisted to move around him but he caught her by the wrist.

“Alina, don’t walk away. I was worried about you!” His brow furrowed as if he was having trouble explaining the obvious.

“Oh, I wouldn’t possibly know what _that_ feels like,” she said pointedly, every syllable dripping with sarcasm. She tried to shake him off, but he held on adamantly. His grip wasn’t overly tight or painful which only made Alina madder when she couldn’t break free. “Let me go, Mal.”

His eyes darted to her wrist like he hadn’t know he was even holding it, but instead of letting go he pulled her hand up. “You’re bleeding!”

And so she was. Blood oozed out of a deep, but clean cut on the palm of her hand. She must have cut herself when she was fighting to get the tree out of the window. She hadn’t even noticed it, but now that she did, a sharp burning pain settled across her palm as Mal inspected it.

“Ow! Let me go!”

Mal’s face was a crumpled unreadable thing as he dropped her wrist. “If I had been here that wouldn’t have happened would it?”

“Why do you even care?” Alina asked him quietly as she wondered how much of her hurt ing general wouldn’t have happened if he had just been there for her.

“Because I love you. You’re my family, Alina! How could you even ask that?”

The words cut through her, sharper than they should. Love, but just familial. Nothing else, nothing more, no matter what Zoya gossiped about in hushed, snarky tones.

“Just go back to whatever you were doing. The house is fine now, I don’t need you anymore.”

She pushed her way past him and ignored his stuttering arguments. Ignoring the mess that was Mal’s room she went to the bathroom to clean herself up and inspect her cut. As she washed the layers of grim off she could here Mal moving around in his room, but by the time she finished up in the bathroom he was gone. His room looked like it had been mopped, most of his stuff was back in place, and there were new sheets on his bed.

Alina looked down at her bandaged hand.

_‘I don’t need you anymore.’_

She clenched her fist hard enough to bloody the wrapping, not knowing if she actually meant what she had said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry that this took so long to get out, but I realized that I needed some time to figure out where exactly this story was going! And boy oh boy is it going places (far away from Mal too!). I'm planning on a total of 18 chapters. ;)
> 
> I'm not quite sure if I even like this chapter, but I just wanted to move past it. I hope angsty Alina isn't too much, but it just feels (tragically) right. lol At least we got some Zoya drama!
> 
> Thank you all for your input about the smut level! It was all positive so I'm going to go for it (although I'm not quite sure when it's going to come up)! In the meantime I'm going to keep the rating T until the smut hits the fan and I'll leave a warning note at the beginning of whatever chapter it starts in!
> 
> Anyways, I hope you enjoyed, comments/kudos are the bae, and I'll see y'all soon! :3


	13. I Hate Herring

It was already Friday morning and Aleksander hadn’t texted Alina back like he said he would. She didn’t know where they were going, what she should wear, or if he was picking her up. Saints, she didn’t even know if they were actually still on for dinner. She had texted him twice that week, once on Wednesday asking if she should try to get anything nice to wear and then yesterday asking for more details about the date. She knew her phone was shitty, but Aleksander aware of that, so if he wasn’t getting her texts he would have tried to call or text her anyways.

Right?

Alina wasn’t so sure. All of their interactions so far had been quite the grab-bag of success and failure. She wasn’t familiar enough with him to know if he was just busy or purposefully ignoring her. For all she knew Zoya had somehow gotten to him and Mal both, creating one of the world’s most attractive love triangles and eloping to Novyi Zem.

She gritted her teeth. At the risk of seeming desperate she was going to try texting him _one more time_ and if he didn’t respond she was going to have to wipe her hands of him. Unless he had a very good reason for not texting or calling. Maybe he was lying in a ditch somewhere or Volcra and Vo’ya had eaten him.

Maybe he was just a rich douchebag messing around with Alina.

<< Hey, I don’t know if you’ve gotten my last two texts. Are we still on for tonight?

It took Alina three tries before she didn’t completely hate the wording of the text and she read it about four times before finally hitting send. With a resigned sigh she started to tuck her phone into her pocket, not expecting an answer anytime soon. But before she could, it miraculously buzzed in her hand.

Aleksander  
>> Text me when you usually get off work with the address and I’ll pick you up then. Casual clothes are fine.

Excitement and annoyance curled around her in equal measure and she fired back a text quickly.  
<< So you aren’t going to tell me where we’re going?

She waited a few minutes thinking that he would text her back, but he didn’t. She was so confused. If he had gotten her first texts and just not responded, why would he respond to this one? And he hadn’t even apologized!

After texting him the information that he asked for, Alina stuffed the phone angrily into her pocket and made her way out of the back room where she had been taking her break. She came face to face with Nikolai who matched her scowl with a bright grin.

“Only you would come off of break looking more tired.” He joked and lightheartedly elbowed her.

“Don’t start with me Sturmhond.” She snapped and sauntered to the counter.

Weirdly enough that actually seemed to work. Usually Nikolai would keep pestering her until she she was on the verge of violence. Lately though he had been pushing her less and less. They still hadn’t talked about what had happened after their froyo adventure and Alina wasn’t sure where they stood anymore.

Every once in a while Nikolai would get a serious cast to his normally cheerful face and looked like he wanted to ask her something. But Alina always managed to eject herself from the conversation at the last minute. Sometimes more obviously than others. Yesterday when he had gotten to work extra early Alina had avoided him by claiming to need full concentration to count the number of straws they had in stock.

It was ridiculous and rude Alina knew, but she couldn’t help the panic that set in when he turned his troubled eyes on her. She just wasn’t ready for whatever question he was going to ask her. Not that she would ever let him know, but she was already missing the relentless banter that used to be their norm and she was worried that it would be gone forever the moment his question was out in the open between them.

So she tried to keep her head down and her interactions strictly professional.

~ ~ ~

“You’re WHAT?” Genya almost dropped the eyeliner pencil she was holding to Alina’s eye.

“Ouch! Genya, I don’t know much about makeup, but I’m pretty sure the eyeliner isn’t supposed to actually go in your eyes!” Alina yelped and leaned away from Genya’s beauty tool turned weapon. They had been doing their usual routine of getting Alina ready for their shift at the boutique when Alina had revealed that she had a date that night with Aleksander.

Ignoring Alina’s complaints, Genya grabbed her forcefully by the back of the neck and held her in place while she continued to apply the eyeliner angrily. “You should have told me you were going on a date _before_ I started your makeup! I would have broken out my new glitter pallet!”

“I’m sorry! Please don’t maim me!”

Genya continued what she was doing, but let some of the tension leave her hands.

“Besides,” Alina continued, “He said to dress casual and I have a feeling that glitter doesn’t fall under that category.”

Genya huffed a little sigh. “At least let me put some liquid lipstick on you. I promise it won’t be too much and it won’t come off no matter what… _activities_ the night holds.” She waggled her eyebrows suggestively. “Where are you two going?”

“I don’t know. He wouldn’t tell me.”

“Ummm. Alina? That sounds kind of sketchy. Didn’t you say he was rich? Now I’m getting some Fifty Shades vibes.” Genya looked serious but then broke out in a wicked grin. “If he he tries to get you to sign a contract or puts on his ‘dom pants’ you better run. Take pictures first though!”

Alina rolled her eyes. “I think it will be fine. I’ll text you if I need help and when I get home.”

Genya dipped a large brush into a pot of blush dubiously. “Okay, but if he hurts you…”

“I know, I know. Consider the shovel talk noted,” Alina laughed. “I’m kind of annoyed myself at him not telling me, but I’m also pretty excited.”

Her friend set down the makeup and held Alina’s hands in hers. “I’m really proud of you, ya know? You’ve really been putting yourself out there lately with both your art and your love life. And I know how hard that is for you.”

Alina shifted uncomfortably under the praise, but allowed herself to be hugged tightly. Genya turned her face to Alina’s ear and whispered, “I wasn’t kidding about taking those pictures though.”

Alina groaned and extracted herself from Genya’s grasp.

“And you still haven’t told me all about your date with Nikolai! For shame Alina. For shame!”

Alina groaned harder.

~ ~ ~

When she got off work, Aleksander was already waiting for her next to his fancy black car. She had no idea what type it was, but she could tell that it was ridiculously expensive and could probably go three times the speed limit if he pushed it.

Without saying a word, he held the passenger door open for her. The gesture felt off, polite on the surface but with an undercurrent of possessiveness and expectation. And after his lack of communication that week, it pissed Alina off.

“You going to buckle me in too?” It was meant as a joke, but her annoyance managed to cut through her tone.

Aleksander raised an eyebrow and leaned into the open door slightly. “Do you want me to?” His tone was low and provocative.

“No!” Alina squeaked as she hastily fastened her seatbelt. Aleksander chuckled under his breath and close the door softly.

The car ride was quiet and tense. Alina wanted to break the silence by asking him why in the world he had ignored her texts, but for some reason she felt like they were in a competition. It was almost like a game where whoever talked first would lose. And she already felt like she was behind by getting flustered when he asked if she wanted him to buckle her in.

So instead of talking she took in her surroundings. Every inch of the interior was covered in soft black leather accented with gold. She couldn’t see any clutter in the car; no spare change, receipts, pens, water bottles, wrappers, or parking passes. It was almost like he had just driven it out of the dealership. There wasn’t even dust on the dashboard or dirt on the floor mats.

“Did you just get this thing cleaned?” She couldn’t help but ask him.

“No.” He answered simply, not taking his eyes off of the road.

“Well, it’s very… clean.” Alina said feeling supremely stupid. She fixed her gaze directly in front of her and wondered if there was any way she could fling herself out of the car now and still live.

She heard Aleksander laugh, or really exhale with slightly more force from his nose.

“What?” She snapped.

“Nothing.”

“You laughed.”

“Well it’s just that this is a _very_ nice car and the only comment you have for it is that it is _clean_?”

Alina trailed a hand across the buttery leather, he did kind of have a point. “It’s also very black?”

His chuckle was obvious this time. A few minutes later he turned into a parking lot and brought the car to stop. They were parked in front of a cutesy diner that was modeled to look like it was from fifty years ago. This couldn’t be where he was taking her to dinner, could it?

He got out of the car smoothly, but when Alina tried to do the same she found her door to be locked. Aleksander made his way around the car and opened the door for her. He extended a hand that she refused to take as she scrambled out of the car.

“Child locks? Really?” She asked him, but he just hummed a little like he couldn’t hear her.

They made their way over to the diner. _Okay, this is actually happening._ Alina couldn’t help but feel just a little bit disappointed. But who could really blame her for expecting more after he picked her up in his fancy car? Sure, he told her to dress casual, but… _Oh well_ , Alina mentally shook herself. _This might be unexpected, but hey, at least my date is still really,_ really _hot._

When he opened the door to the diner for her, the first thing Alina noticed other than the intense checkerboard flooring was a wall of heat. She could already feel a little trickle of sweat run down her back.

As if reading her mind, Aleksander leaned over and whispered in her ear, “You’ll get used to it.”

A peppy host led them to a red pleather booth and Alina sat across from Aleksander.

“So you come here often?” She asked him.

“A fair amount.” He said without elaboration.

Alina picked up the laminated menu in front of her and inspected it. There was a wide range of food from burgers to flapjacks to milkshakes. When Alina noticed that there was even pickled herring and rye, she had to suppress a gagging noise.

Aleksander didn’t pick up his menu, staring at Alina instead while she looked over hers. The feelings of his eyes focused on her made her neck hot in a way that had nothing to do with the overly warm diner.

“Aren’t you going to look at the menu?” She asked curiously.

“I already know what I want.”

Alina couldn’t tell if it was just an overactive imagination, but the way he looked her dead in the eyes when talked seemed to imply that what he wanted was _her_. She gulped a little, nervously. Luckily the waiter approached at that moment, sparing Alina from whatever stuttering sentence she would have said next.

The waiter had coal-black hair collected into a severe bun at the nape of her neck. Something about her looked familiar, but Alina couldn’t place her stern face and it was impossible to determine her exact age. Alina’s best guess was anywhere between 35 and 65 years old. Maybe it had something to do with her slightly puffed sleeves and paper food service hat.

“You’re usual, Aleks?” She asked him with a bored and slightly annoyed expression on her face.

“Yes please and for my date as well.”

Alina opened her mouth to protest, but the waiter had already walked off. Horrified she turned to Aleksander. “What did you just order me?”

“Don’t worry this place makes the best food in town.” The corners of his grey eyes crinkled with contained laughter.

“That wasn’t an answer to my question.” She snapped.

“You’ll like it. I promise.”

“What did you order?” She carefully enunciated each word.

His eyes uncrinkled. “My favorite food.” He said flatly.

“And what’s that?”

He didn’t say anything and Alina scoffed. “You don’t even know if I have any food allergies!”

“Do you?”

Alina paused. “Well, no but…”

Silence fell between them as he looked at her pointedly.

“Look, could you please just tell me?” A pleading tone entered her voice and it grated against her own ears.

“Pickled herring and rye,” he said, all traces of humor gone from his voice.

Alina closed her eyes mournfully, her voice almost a whisper. “Oh Aleksander, you didn’t.”

He stayed silent, but even with her eyes closed she could still tell that he was looking at her intently.

“I hate herring.” She said, barely audible over the ambient noise.

“Oh.”

Alina opened her eyes. “Yes, _Oh_.”

He frowned. “Baghra isn’t going to like that.”

“Like what? Who’s Baghra.” Alina asked, now completely confused.

“Our waiter.” He said then turned in his seat and waved to the woman. Alina could hear a grumpy “Hmph” from across the room.

“What do you want now, boy?” She asked when she showed up at the table.

Aleksander looked at Alina expectedly. She scrambled and picked the first thing she saw on the menu. “Oh! Umm, could I have the blueberry flapjacks instead? I ah… don’t like herring.”

Baghra harrumphed again and snatched the menu out of Alina’s hands as if to prevent her from changing her order again. Once she was out of earshot, Alina leaned across the table a little to whisper to Aleksander. “Wow, you weren’t kidding.”

The corner of his lips twitched. “You actually got off easy. She didn’t even call you a name.”

Now that Alina’s order was sorted out she felt more at ease. She was still a little irritated that Aleksander had tried to order for her to begin with, but she decided to move past it for now. They managed to fall into an easy conversation about art, his dogs, Alina’s friends, and even both of their work. As every topic came and went she found herself growing more and more comfortable with him.

When their food showed up the conversation stalled for a little as they dug in. Aleksander hadn’t been kidding. Alina’s blueberry pancakes had her eyelids fluttering with pleasure and little, unintentional moans escaping her mouth. Normally she would be embarrassed, but in this case she didn’t care. The food was just that good.

They both cleared their entire plates, an almost unheard of achievement for Alina. “That was amazing! We have to come back here again.” Her voice was dreamy as she leaned back into the seat contentedly.

“Again?” He queried, one eyebrow raised.

Alina spluttered and tried to backtrack, but Aleksander just looked more and more amused so she stopped.

“I’m going to go pay then use the bathroom. Feel free to wait in the car.” He passed her his keys.

Dumbfounded, Alina accepted the keys. “Really?”

“I trust you.” He said over his shoulder as he walked away.

She got up and made her way out of the restaurant. When she passed by Baghra she wished her a goodnight only to get a ‘foolish girl’ in return. Yikes.

The air was unexpectedly cold when opened the door and she hesitated for a moment in the door way. Aleksander had been right again, she had gotten used to the warm diner and now she didn’t want to go outside. “Shut the door, girl. You’re letting the heat out.” Baghra yelled at her and she hastily jumped outside.

She let herself into the driver’s side of Aleksander’s car so that she could turn on the heater. For a second Alina was completely baffled. There didn’t seem to be a car key on the key ring. And even if there had been one, there didn’t seem to be an ignition. There was however a button that read “Start/Stop.” Alina took a chance and pressed it. When she did the engine didn’t roar to life, it simply purred. She found herself wondering exactly how expensive the car was. She would never steal it, but if she did… A low whistle of appreciation escaped her. _That would be a lot of money._

Like the rest of the interior, the steering wheel was covered in soft black leather. She put her hands on it, letting each finger fall into the wide grooves. Aleksander had large hands. The thought made her blush.

A soft tap sounded at the window and she jumped. The owner was looking at her with his usual faint amusement. He opened the door and she made to get out, but he stopped her. “Would you like to drive?”

“I ah… can’t drive, never learned.” She admitted with some embarrassment. Most Ravkans learned how to drive from the tender age of fifteen and she was almost a decade older than that.

“Maybe I’ll teach you sometime.” He extended a hand to her and she took it this time. He continued to hold it as he led her around to the other side of the car. Alina tried and failed not to notice how big his hands were compared to hers.

But when he moved to open the door she stopped him. “Look, the gesture is really nice, but you have to stop going out of your way to open doors for me. Maybe other woman you’ve dated have liked it, but for me it just feels infantilizing.” She rested a hand on his sleeve gently to try and let him know that her goal wasn’t insult him.

Aleksander looked at her appraisingly then nodded. He squeezed her hand a little then went back to his side of the car. Alina got in the car feeling like she had finally done something right on their date.

“So what did you think of Baghra?” He backed up out of the parking lot.

“She was… nice?” Alina said hesitantly, not knowing why he was asking.

He side-eyed her. “Oh, fine she was gruff.” Alina admitted.

“Yes, that is a word that could be used to describe her. She actually owns the restaurant.” He paused to pass a slow car on the road. “I keep telling her that she doesn’t need to act like a waiter anymore, but she says she likes it better that way.”

“Are you two close?”

“She’s my mother.”

Alina blinked for a moment then burst out into peals of laughter. She must have startled him because the car jerked slightly.

“I’m sorry! I just-,” more peals of laughter, “wasn’t expecting that.” Tears were running down her face and her stomach was starting to get sore.

“I don’t understand.”

“Aleksander! You had me meet your mother on our _second_ date!” Alina managed to calm down a bit, but a few stray hiccups of laughter kept escaping her. She looked over at her date whose face was impassive.

“I don’t mind!” She hastened to say. “It just caught me off guard.”

He just nodded and they settled back into a silence that was less comfortable this time. _Nice job Alina_ , she thought to herself, _way to insult your date about his mother_.

“Are you free tomorrow?” He asked her suddenly.

“Well, I was thinking of organizing my sock drawer and washing my hair, but I think I could pencil you in.” She teased. “What did you have in mind?”

“I would like to show you my house, more specifically my studio. We could spend some time painting.”

Alina didn’t try to be funny or clever, she just said exactly what she was thinking. “That would be amazing.”

“Perfect.” He smiled and Alina’s heart practically summersaulted out of the car.

They discussed the details of the plan and in a few minutes they were parked in front of Alina’s house.

“May I walk you to your door, or would that fall under the category of ‘out of the way gestures?’”

Alina hesitated. She very much wanted him to walk her to the house and then collect her kiss for ‘passing go’, but she had no idea if Mal was home. She wasn’t sure how he would react to Aleksander, but she doubted it would be good.

Misreading her hesitancy, he reached over and gave her hand a final squeeze. “I’ll see you tomorrow Alina.” She squeezed back then walked back to her house alone. When she opened the front door she looked over her shoulder and was surprised to see that Aleksander’s car was still there. He waved a hand at her then drove away.

Alina realized that he was waiting for her to make it safely home since he couldn’t walk her there himself.

And she hadn’t gotten to kiss him. All because she was worried about Mal’s reaction.

How messed up was that?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Only Aleksander would unthinkingly have his mother chaperone a second date for him. *Cackles* I'm really into Alina and Aleksander's push/pull competitive relationship. 
> 
> I had so much more fun writing this chapter than the last! Maybe because Mal's name was only mentioned twice? 
> 
> Next chapter the Alarkling game with be even stronger, so buckle up! ヽ(・∀・)ﾉ
> 
> I'm posting this on labor day so if you celebrate I hope you had a nice relaxing day. (I also hope that for those of you who don't celebrate too!)


	14. There Will Be Repercussions

Alina had a goal.

Get kissed by Aleksander Morozova.

There had been enough dancing around, accidental interruptions, and modesty enough for a Saint. Alina was ready, more than ready. If she could just find that box she was looking for…

She opened and shut several of the drawers of her chipped white dresser. She had hidden it almost immediately upon Genya giving it to her so of course now when she actually might need it she couldn’t find it. Alina’s hand rummaged around in the depths of her sock drawer until it came in contact with an edge of cardboard.

 _Success!_ She thought as she pulled it from the dresser. But of course instead of it coming out smoothly it had to catch on the edge of the drawer and spill out its contents.

Ten completely untouched condom wrappers lay on the floor in a messy heap. As quickly as she could, she scooped them all back into the box. Alina was tempted to put the entire thing back under the mound of mismatched socks, but it was not like they would do anybody any good sitting in there. She tucked a couple of the condoms into her purse as her cheeks radiated with embarrassed heat. At least Genya would be proud.

Okay, so maybe Alina was over preparing, getting ahead of herself. But she had been thinking about Aleksander all night; the quirk of his lips, the way his large slender hands curled around the steering wheel, the intensity of his grey eyes when he looked at her. She didn’t just want a kiss, she wanted all of it, all of him.

A hot hunger curled around in her stomach that had nothing to do with food. Alina was 23 and still a virgin. She was starving.

It wasn’t like she hadn’t had opportunities in the past, although most of those had just been drunken fumblings. Alina just hadn’t been really interested in anybody.

Well, except for Mal.

But with each passing day of aloof distance he was seeming like less and less of an option. Not just as a love interest, but as friend too. Besides, it wasn’t like he had stayed chaste for her. _He_ wasn’t the one who carried the title of ‘Little Saint’ on his head like a heavy crown.

Most of the time Alina tried not to think about her virginity. It was just a fact of life. A milestone that she hadn’t gotten to yet, but eventually would. In a way it reminded her of her lack of a driver’s license. And hadn’t Aleksander offered to teach her how to drive?

Absolutely, irresistibly attractive Aleksander Morozova.

So Alina had a goal to get kissed, but that was her minimum.

Alina’s phone buzzed in her pocket and she felt caught red handed. The condom box that she hadn’t put away yet seemed to stare back at her knowingly.

Aleksander  
>> I have an unexpected meeting this morning. I need to reschedule to the afternoon.

 _Okay so that might not be the best start to ‘Plan: Kiss Aleksander’_ , she thought to herself disappointedly. It was okay though, he hadn’t canceled, just rescheduled. Alina sent back a text letting him know it was okay and asking if 2 pm would be late enough.

>> Perfect. I’ll pick you up then.  
>> If you give me your coffee order I can grab it on the way.

Alina’s eyes narrowed at the screen, feeling like that was about as close to an apology for changing plans as she would get. She had noticed that especially over text Aleksander was pretty… inconsiderate. He didn’t really ask, more just expected Alina to go along with whatever he wanted.

They may need to work on that.  In the meantime, though? Alina had just thought of the perfect pun.

<< That would make me very Frappé.  
<< 18oz plain coconut milk latte, no foam, please!

>> Are you asking for a Frappé or a Latte?

<< The Frappé part was a pun for the word happy.

The dot-dot-dot sign appeared then disappeared like Aleksander had started to write something then stopped. _Oh Saints, what have I done? He thinks my pun is stupid and that I’m stupid by default._ Alina panicked, wishing there was a way to rescind text messages.

The dot-dot-dot sign appeared again and her breath caught in her throat.

>> I find your coffee pun to be lukewarm at best.  
>> ;)

Alina’s heart stopped dead at the sight of the singular winky face emoji and it took her a few minutes before she was able to fully function again. She stashed the now slightly depleted condom box into the drawer again, making sure to cover it with a few layers of socks.

A funny little realization hit her.

When Aleksander had asked her if she had any plans she had joked that she was going to organize her sock drawer. A single hysterical chuckle escaped her.

_If only he knew…_

~ ~ ~ ~

When Aleksander came to pick her up, Alina was standing by the street. Mal hadn’t been home last night and she hadn’t seen him around since the windstorm, but she still wasn’t going to take any chances. Unlike Nikolai, Aleksander hadn’t been exposed to whatever was going on with Mal lately and Alina wanted to keep it that way.

And if she was being honest? Alina didn’t want to be exposed to Mal right now either. She was more than happy with the short essential texts they had exchanged about fixing the window and the passive aggressive grocery list she had taped to his door. She loved Mal, was probably still in love with him, and always would be. But for right now she just wanted to pretend like she could be normal or even desirable without him. Because she definitely didn’t feel that way when she was with him.

But the way Aleksander’s steady grey gaze studied her made her feel that way. Just the prospect, not even the promise, of a kiss had her buzzing with excitement. It was strong enough to shove down and ignore her thoughts of Mal. It was thrilling and terrifying all at once and Alina was going to chase it to wherever it led, no matter how reckless.

She opened his car door and threw in her ratty backpack full of painting supplies and followed it clumsily. Alina wasn’t sure what exactly his “painting” plans entailed so she had picked a few of her favorite brushes and essential collections of some water colors, oils, and acrylics. It wasn’t really all that much, but it still filled her bag enough to make getting into the low sports car difficult.

“Elegant as always, Alina.” Aleksander said and the cool resonance of his voice was already starting to have an unfortunate effect on her heartrate.

She tried and failed to ignore it.

“You’ve used that joke already.” She grumbled and buckled herself in, not trusting herself to look directly at him. “Coffee,” she demanded.

He passed it to her wordlessly then pulled away from the curb. Alina tried a sip of her coffee to give her mouth something to do other than embarrass her.

The taste of the warm liquid was ever so slightly different than she was expecting. _Weird. Maybe it’s a different blend?_

Alina inspected the side of the drink to find that it wasn’t from the Ravkan Brew. The paper cup had the Druskëlle logo of a white wolf on it instead of the golden double eagle that she was used to.

Druskëlle was the Ravkan Brew’s biggest competitor, a Fjerdan owned company. If asked, Alina would probably deny just how loyal she was to the company that she worked for. It was an odd sort of loyalty, one she couldn’t quite explain, but at the very least the Brew was the only place she turned to for all of her employee-discounted-needs. And Aleksander was pretty much the second in command of the large company, so she had assumed that he would do the same.

“Ummmm… What’s this?” Alina asked, completely baffled.

He frowned. “An 18 ounce plain coconut milk latte with no foam.”

“No, I mean the cup… Druskëlle? Isn’t that like treason?”

His chuckle was low and bitter. “Just research,” he said cryptically.

“Oh, okay…” She trailed off and they settled into a slightly uneasy silence. Alina stared out the window as she thought over what Aleksander had said. Or more specifically the way he had said it, with deep undercurrent of anger.

Instead of making their way towards one of Os Alta’s fancy suburbs like she had expected, they were headed towards the heart of the city. Aleksander expertly wove through the notoriously thick traffic of the bustling downtown area until he pulled into a parking garage.

“Where are we?” She said as he pulled into a parking space marked with his name.

He raised an eyebrow as if to say ‘Really, Alina, you can’t possibly be this slow,’ but instead said, “My place, of course.”

Aleksander slid out of the car and Alina scrambled to follow him as he headed towards an elevator.

“But… You can’t possibly own this building.” She squeaked. “Can you?”

“Of course not. I just rent one of its units.”

The low bitter laugh was back. And Alina didn’t think he was laughing at her expense, but the heavy weight of it still set her slightly on edge.

She followed him into the elevator and a quick glance at the control panel showed that they were headed to the top floor. The penthouse.

Alina rolled her eyes slightly. What else should she have expected? The man standing next to her was practically the dictionary picture of extra. Everything about him was intense and over the top.

Even now, instead of standing like a normal person would in the elevator- with both feet on the ground, face pointed at the door, hands in pockets or resting by their thighs- he was leaning away from Alina with one shoulder against the wall. His legs crossed casually, arms folded easily, with one eyebrow cocked and ready as he stared at Alina.

“What?” She snapped irritably with the distinct feeling like she was being studied.

“You rolled your eyes.”

“I roll my eyes a lot.”

“Why?” His tone was neutral enough that she couldn’t tell if he was making fun of her or was actually curious.

Alina couldn’t think of a single good answer to that, only almost-questions that she wasn’t sure she wanted the answer to. _Because it’s who I am? Because the world is trying? Because YOU are trying? Because you are so alluring that it terrifies me? Because I am nothing compared to you?_

Instead she just said, “Don’t know, but when I do, you’ll be the first to know.”

“I’ll hold you to that.” He said and this time there was no mistaking the lit of humor to his tone. It left Alina flustered.

The elevator pinged to a stop and the doors opened to reveal a small waiting room with only one door on the end. They had reached the penthouse.

Aleksander didn’t reach for any keys, he just pulled on the door and it opened.

“You don’t keep your apartment locked?”

“It’s not necessary.” He said as he gestured her to enter a dark room.

Warning bells should have gone off in Alina’s head. She was entering the darkened apartment of a man that she hardly knew. A man who was as distinctly odd as he was attractive. Nobody knew she was here; she hadn’t thought to tell Genya or Alexei. She definitely hadn’t told Mal. There was no telling what Aleksander’s true motives could hold.

But Alina didn’t think of any of those things. Instead she let herself be led.

If Aleksander’s car had been an inky black pool of leather his apartment was an ocean. Almost every surface was black, although not all of it was leather. The darkness of it might have been flat out depressing if it weren’t for the floor to ceiling windows illuminating the gloomy décor and casting a shine on the ebony floorboards.

Everything was sleek and perfect in its proper place. The layout was open and simple with sightlines from the kitchen to the massive dining table to the living area. And just like his car, the apartment was absolutely spotless. There were no traces of dust to cast a pallor on any surface. He had to have somebody come and clean the place at least weekly.

Alina could feel Aleksander’s eyes on her as she took in the apartment. They hadn’t said anything since they entered and Alina realized that he was waiting for her judgement. So she made sure to spend an extra minute or two longer when looking around than she needed.

“It’s very clean... And very black.” She said with a smirk, pleased with the inside joke she had made. “Honestly though, you do have quite the theme going. I feel like I’ve only just scratched the surface of what a nerd you are… a goth nerd.”

He gave her an almost weary look.

“Feel free to roll your eyes, Aleksander. It’s quite liberating and I can practically feel your eyes itching from over here.” Feeling proud of her casual humor in the face of her nerves, Alina met Aleksander’s eyes and matched the intensity she found there.

He only stood a few feet away from her. She could easily reach out a hand for him, tug on the rich silk of his black suit, and pull him into her. Alina could feel her fingers twitch against her thigh with temptation.

A soft, but frantic, chorus of clicking noises filled the air, breaking the tension between them. Two fluffs of shadows came barreling at her, one larger than the other, and Alina immediately knelt down to greet Volcra and Vo’ya. She used both hands to administer pets and babbled pointless baby talk and the puppies. When they licked at her hands and forearms with warm tongues, she laughed.

A few minutes passed and Alina realized that Aleksander was still standing, observing her silently while she acted like a raving lunatic around his dogs. She peeked a glance from under her hair expecting to see exasperation or annoyance, but she found nothing of the sort there. Instead his eyes were soft and a corner of his mouth was raised into a slight smirk.

“Ready to see the studio?” He asked and there was a hint of amusement to his tone.

She had been caught staring at him. Alina blushed and let her hair fall into her face before mumbling a ‘yes’ and rising to follow him.

Aleksander led her down a wide hallway. He didn’t look over his shoulder to see if Alina was following. He didn’t need to.

At the end of the hall he opened a wide door and the entryway practically glowed with the light contained in the next room. Alina stepped through in bewilderment and awe.

Aleksander’s studio was almost the polar opposite to the rest of the apartment. Instead of the rich ebony floors there was pale, easy to clean concrete and the walls were painted a crisp white instead of gloomy black. The same floor to ceiling windows were there, giving a near panoramic view of Os Alta, and they let in the perfect amount of lighting for painting.

“Wow,” Alina breathed as she circled slowly to take in the space. There were paintings everywhere. Some on the walls, others neatly stacked on a canvas drying racks, and a couple still on their easels, spread throughout the room. The back wall held almost a full art-store’s worth of supplies and Alina’s old backpack suddenly felt even more drab in comparison.

“You like it.” Aleksander said confidently.

“I do.” She replied honestly, not caring if she appeared overly eager.

“Good. Now let’s get to work.”

He set up a pair of easels and stools next to each other and gestured for Alina to sit on one. She dragged her backpack over with her, but when she opened it to take out her supplies he shot her a long look until she put her supplies back. He rolled over a small cart of acrylic paints and brushes then grabbed two large canvases.

“Really, Aleksander?” Alina said eyeing all 30x40 inches of the obviously high quality canvas. It had to cost over a day’s worth of her wages. “You can’t insist that I use your art supplies _and_ this giant canvas. It’s too much!”

He was already dipping a wide brush into a carton of jet black paint and didn’t bother to look over at her. It was the only color he had in such a large container, the rest were packaged away in small metal tubes. He gestured a free hand towards a corner of the room. “It’s not like I have a shortage.”

She glanced over at a large pile of about fifty blank canvases, some of which were even bigger than the one he had given her.

“Besides,” he let his brush pause against the canvas and turned his intense eyes on Alina. “I want to see what you can do when you aren’t limited by dollar store supplies.”

Alina didn’t know if she should be touched by the gesture or insulted by it. He turned his head back to his canvas, but not before she caught a ghost of a cocky smile on his lips.

Insulted.

Alina was definitely insulted.

Angrily she started mixing colors together to form a pale peach color and practically attacked her canvas with the hue. At first her frustration drove the painting forward, especially whenever things blended easier than usual or her brush fibers didn’t fray like they usually would after a few minutes. But after a while she became engrossed in what she was painting.

Alina forgot to feel angry as her vision came to life in front of her. A familiar face started to appear under her brush as she traced the lines in her mind’s eye. There was a riot of red hair twisted into flames that licked along the long line of pale, graceful neck. And pair of amber eyes full of sunshine stared back at her. It was Genya as one of her Sun Woman.

Genya had always been supportive of Alina’s art and Alina had always wanted to make something huge for her, but could never afford the supplies. And since she was still a bit nervous to accept the paint and canvas from Aleksander, making something for her friend instead of herself seemed like the best compromise and defiance.

Alina paused and leaned back from her canvas to inspect it. She was trying to decide if she needed to increase or tone down the highlights on Genya’s cheekbones when she caught the movement of Aleksander’ brush out of the corner of her eye.

Alina’s heart gave a painful thump. At some point Aleksander had removed his suit jacket and rolled up the sleeves of his button up shirt. The tips of his fingers were stained with black paint and little flecks radiated to his forearms. So absorbed in her own art, Alina had almost forgot that he was there. And now that she remembered she couldn’t stop staring at the contrast of the dark paint against his skin.

His wrist made delicate flicking motions as he highlighted the edge of what looked like a bare tree branch. Although the color he was using to highlight would have been a deep shadow in Alina’s painting.

Aleksander’s wrist paused and he turned to look Alina dead in the eye.

“Yes?” He asked with a knowing smirk.

“What? Nothing!” Alina snapped in a panic and turned to face her own work.

“Oh, I just could have sworn that you were staring at me.” He said and Alina’s cheeks burned with an embarrassed heat.

“Was not.” She mumbled into her canvas, trying and failing to pretend to be fascinated by her own brushstrokes.

He responded with a very unconvinced “really” that only added to her embarrassed state.

Alina whirled on him, paint brush held menacingly. “Don’t you dare start with me, Morozova.” She warned.

His black eyebrow raised slowly as he took her in. “This is an expensive suit.” He said conversationally and without any concern, despite the dirty brush hovered over his chest like a sword.

“You could have changed before we started.” Alina pointed out with a cunning smile. She had no intention of actually getting paint on him, but was having immense fun pretending like she would.

“I might have if I knew you would turn against me.” His eyes were fiercely playful.

Without warning a drop of white paint fell away from the brush and onto Aleksander’s chest. It was absolutely unmistakable against his black shirt. Alina’s free hand went over her mouth in horror.

“There will be repercussions.” Aleksander’s eyes narrowed and a little shiver of anticipation ran down Alina’s spine.

Almost faster than her eyes could follow, Aleksander’s brush snaked out at her. He swiped a dollop of cold, inky black paint onto her nose in retaliation. Alina squealed and immediately sought retribution of her own. She scooped her hand along her paint palette and reached out for Aleksander.

He deftly dodged and grabbed the larger paintbrush he had used to set the base of his canvas. She shrieked as he flicked the end of it at her creating a line of black drops on her shirt.

Things quickly dissolved into a full out paint war. Alina’s bright colors against Aleksander’s dark hues. They circled each other around the room, seizing open containers and dirty brushes as they went. But it was soon clear who the victor was going to be as Alina slowly backed away from Aleksander. She had accidently dropped her paintbrush and was about to admit defeat when her heel slipped out from underneath her.

She had stepped in a puddle of bright yellow paint of her own creation. Aleksander lunged for her and was dragged along as he tried to soften her fall.

Alina’s back connected firmly with the cold concrete, but Aleksander had wrapped a protective hand behind her head to keep her safe. She was a bit winded but overall unharmed.

Or at least, that was what she thought in the few seconds before she realized their position and her heart started to riot.

Their legs tangled together on the floor and Aleksander’s torso hovered barely an inch above hers. He gave a winded chuckle and she could feel his breath against her lips like the promise of a kiss.

“You know, you could have just asked nicely instead of dragging me to the ground.” Aleksander said and Alina’s eyes were fixed on the way his lips moved around the words.

“And what would be the fun in that?” Her voice was breathy from the fall and the feeling of his warm hand on the back of her neck.

Aleksander smirked, not moving any closer, and Alina couldn’t stand it anymore. She grabbed the collar of his already ruined shirt with her messy hands and drew his smirking lips to her own.

The points of contact that they shared- the hand at the back of her neck, the press of legs against each other, the soft scrape of her knuckles against his neck as she clung to his collar -all warmed to a scorching heat.

He moved his free hand under Alina’s back and pulled her even closer so that she bowed into him and their torso’s were flush. He rewarded her eagerness with a slight tug of his teeth on her bottom lip.

Alina moaned as want zinged through her and Aleksander deepened the kiss with his hot tongue.

She may have initiated the exchange, but he was quickly gaining control. The hand at her lower back slipped under her shirt and inched its way up her spine, leaving a trail of burning skin to the band of her bra.

Aleksander traced a narrow finger along the band’s bottom edge, as if asking a question. But Alina found that she wasn’t certain of the answer. She knew that she wanted him and by the press of him against her thigh she knew he wanted her as well, but as his finger hooked around her bra she was filled with a little wave of panic.

She wasn’t sure if she was quite ready for what this was about to lead to. This morning, she thought she had been, but now with paint in her hair and her back to the rough concrete, doubt started to creep in.

The soft snap of elastic as the clasp came undone shook her back to reality.

“Wait. Aleksander, I-” Alina broke the exchange and leaned away gently.

Frowning slightly, Aleksander stopped and leaned back as well to give her some space. His eyes were dark with want, pupils blown wide, and while he had created distance between their top halves, the movement shifted his hips further into her.

And suddenly all hesitation was gone and Alina knew exactly what she wanted.

The shift must have been clear on her face as Aleksander leaned back in.

But instead of a warm mouth, Alina was met with a thick glob of paint fallen from his tousled hair. The taste of it was overwhelming and bitter in her mouth.

She started to gag a little and practically threw Aleksander off of her as she spluttered and searched for something clean to wipe her tongue with. Her hands and shirt were awash with paint and her eyes started to water with the effort of keeping herself from spiting up.

Alina was about to get up and try and find a bathroom, or just run out the apartment in general, when Aleksander presented her with a clean washcloth. Without hesitation she snatched it from him and started to rub frantically at her tongue.

It wasn’t until she felt that her mouth was rubbed raw and dry that she stopped. The taste still lingered, but it was no longer overwhelming to the point of throwing up.

A soft huffing sound filled the room and Alina looked up to find Aleksander’s back slightly turned to her, hands cupping his face. His shaking posture was unmistakable.

He was snickering.

She made a sound of indignation, but that only caused his shoulders to shake harder. Alina got to her feet angrily and waited in a stony silence until his laughter was under control. She held the washcloth out to him, but Aleksander grabbed her wrist instead.

His face was suddenly completely sober and he pulled her towards him so that his mouth was inches away from her ear. Alina gave a little squeak of surprise. His voice was low and serious as he said. “I told you there would be repercussions.”

And then he was snickering into her shoulder. Alina batted a frustrated hand at him, but found that she was laughing too. Hard. Her stomach and faced ached with it and she clung a hand to Aleksander to hold herself up while they shook in unison.

It took a good chunk of time until they were both calm enough to process their surroundings again. The metallic taste of paint still sat on her tongue and her skin started to itch uncomfortably as the paint started to dry. She pulled at her paint-soaked shirt and winced in disgust as it slowly unstuck itself from her skin.

“I guess we’d better clean up.” She said sheepishly.

The smirk was back on Aleksander’s face again and Alina wasn’t so sure that they had the same definition of cleaning up.

“Yes, let’s.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pro tip. NEVER try paint. It is _disgusting_ (and toxic) and not worth it, even if you are trying to figure out how to describe the taste for your fan fic. _LEARN_ from my mistakes.
> 
> This is actually only part one of this date. I was going to make this all one chapter, but suddenly it was over 4,500 words and nowhere near finished. Oh and it was taking forever and I wanted to update. (Thirsty for that praise...)
> 
> Alina is starting to awaken you guys! Although we are still taking quite the scenic route to smut town. >.> lol
> 
> OH! I almost forgot to mention that claryfrary gave me the idea for the paint war!! She is another writer in the fandom and you should definitely go check out her work!!
> 
> Anyways... kudos, comments ect. ect. You know my deep thirst! :P Hope you have a good day! See ya next time!


	15. Pine Needle Shampoo

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The rating on this fic has been bumped up from Teen to Mature. If anyone is interested in a parallel PG-13 version, just let me know in the comments. Otherwise, I'm too lazy to bother lol.

When Alina had been getting ready that morning she had hoped that she might end up naked at Aleksander’s apartment. She had not expected that she would be naked by herself in his guest bathroom under the heavy stream of a rain shower.

She actually hadn’t known what a rain shower even was until a few minutes prior. Aleksander had to explain how to work the damn thing and when water started pouring from the ceiling Alina had yelped.

 _Yelped._ At a _shower_.

Although that honestly hadn’t been as embarrassing as when he asked her if she needed anything else before he went to go take his own shower and she had just stared at his lips. Alina had wanted to say that yes she did need something. Him. In the shower with her. But she had been too chicken to actually say that.

Alina let the luxuriously warm water wash the paint away from her hair as she contemplated everything that had just happened.

She had been about to have sex. _Wanted to have sex._ With somebody other than Mal. She didn’t know whether to feel proud or ashamed of herself. She was leaning towards proud, but the hastiness of her actions made her uneasy.

In so many ways she hardly knew Aleksander. He was still a big mystery to her. A very hot mystery who could kiss like sin incarnate. But a mystery nonetheless.

She sighed as she rubbed shampoo into her hair. It was one of three options she had found in the large tiled expanse of the shower and it smelled faintly of pine needles.

If Alina weren’t still a virgin she doubted that she would be having her current moral conundrum; she could just have sex with whoever she wanted without it having to mean anything.

Instead, if she had sex with Aleksander he would be ‘her first,’ the one to ‘deflower her,’ to ‘accept her most precious gift,’ or any other variation on virginal trope that had been preached to her by multiple foster mothers. She wondered what they would all think if they knew that she was still a virgin at age 23 when the speech had mostly been to avoid a teenage pregnancy that they would then have to deal with.

Alina picked a bottle of conditioner at random and worked it into the ends of her mousy brown hair. This one smelled a bit like warm sandalwood and not for the first time during her shower she wondered how expensive these toiletries must be. They all came in fancy glass bottles in a language that Alina couldn’t read, but looked a bit like Zemeni.

The worst part was the longer Alina waited the more pressure was heaved upon her title of ‘Little Saint.’ There felt like so much expectation for her to find the right person to have sex with for the first time. Somebody who she trusted and cared for deeply, and felt the same in return. Somebody who she maybe even loved.

The expectation felt cruel to Alina because it meant that on top of not having sex, she also didn’t have anybody to love. She knew that didn’t have to be the case and that many people’s first time wasn’t with anybody all that special, but didn’t she deserve the best? Especially at this point?

She rubbed a soft washcloth against some bar soap in the shape of a crescent moon that she had found and her sigh deepened. The thoughts running through her mind were nothing all that new. She had been mulling over the fact of her virginity for years now. Pretty much ever since she had realized that she was in love with Mal and wanted him _in that way_.

But maybe now was the time to let that dream go. She may not know Aleksander that well, but she at least had a strong idea of how well he would treat her if she let him. And who knew? Maybe they would actually start dating.

Maybe they could even fall in love.

The thought made her stomach flip a little in excitement as she stepped out of the shower. Alina didn’t really consider herself to be an optimist, but sometimes it was nice to just hope for a little. She wrapped herself in a thick fluffy towel. The soft brush of cotton against her bare skin was reassuring and Alina found her decision solidifying.

She didn’t have to wait any longer. She was an adult and could have consensual sex with whoever the hell she wanted, first time be damned.  However, she wasn’t going to try and force it. Maybe it would happen tonight with Aleksander or at different time with somebody else. She decided that she would just have to leave it up to her libido to know when the time was right.

~ ~ ~ ~

The skyline of Os Alta at sunset was absolutely breathtaking. Thin fingers of modern steel intermixed with the tapered domes of old Ravkan architecture as they stood starkly against the colorful sky. From where she stood everything looked miniature and so far removed from the city that she had grown up in.

Alina had seen pictures of the skyline before of course. On post cards, television, and plastered across busses. But this was her first time seeing it in person and it made her feel oddly small.

“It’s beautiful.”  She said as she wrapped her arms around herself, almost protectively. She was wearing Aleksander’s clothes and although she was covering more skin than before, she felt exposed. The long sleeved t-shirt and sweatpants were baggy against her her small frame, despite Aleksander not being that large of a man himself. In a way he was built like her, tall and slender, but he pulled it off much better than herself.

“Yes, very.” Aleksander said from behind her.

Alina turned and found his eyes upon her. And for a second it seemed like it wasn’t the skyline that he was talking about. But then he handed her a cup of black coffee and turned his attention to the cityscape.

Alina fought back a little wave of disappointment. Of course he hadn’t been talking about her. She was just a stick of a barista with damp hair that clung to her limply. Alina wasn’t a great beauty like Genya or Zoya. She was just… Alina.

“I’m sorry I don’t have coconut milk.” He said, interrupting her thoughts.

“What?”

“The coffee.” He gestured to the mug he had just handed her. “I have regular milk if you’d like.”

“Oh, um. No. This is fine.” Alina took a tentative sip of the black coffee. It was good. Enough so that he had to have used an espresso machine. She hadn’t heard one, but she might have been stuck in her own head.

They stood in silence for a few minutes, just looking out the window and drinking their coffee. It was much later than Alina had thought it would be. They must have spent hours painting, though it had felt like much less time.

“Are you hungry? I was thinking of ordering in, since your clothes are still in the washing machine.”

Alina hadn’t thought she was hungry, but the sudden promise of food caused her stomach to growl.

“Sure. Did you have anything in mind?” She asked, wondering what other places Aleksander liked to eat from besides the diner.

“Pizza?”

Her stomach growled again and she laughed. “That sounds perfect. Although…” She tilted her head and pretended to consider something serious. “If you put pickled herring on your half I’m walking out.”

“What is this vendetta you have against my favorite food?” Aleksander cocked an eyebrow at her.

Alina paused then asked hesitantly, “Do you really want to know?”

Aleksander gently tapped her arm with an elbow. “Of course.”

“Okay then. I don’t think I’ve told anyone this story before. Not even Ma- my friends.” She stuttered a little, realizing that she hadn’t actually brought up Mal around Aleksander and she had no intention of doing so now.

“I had this foster mother, Ana Kuya, and she wasn’t terrible, honestly she was one of the better ones, but she was convinced that I was too skinny and that the government would blame her for it. So she was always trying to force me to eat. Especially pickled herring, because I didn’t like it much to begin with. I was a stubborn kid, so a couple of times she had to physically force me to eat it and then she would cover my nose and mouth so I had to swallow it.” Alina throat felt tight with the phantom sensation, but she waved off her words with her hand. “Anyways, that was a long time ago. Sorry to be such a downer.”

Aleksander reached over and tucked a hand under her chin, raising it so that her eyes met his. “I don’t think that you’re a downer, Alina. Everybody has their stuff.” He paused and almost seemed to hesitate, something Alina hadn’t seen him do before. “Baghra once locked me in a closet for a few hours.”

“Your mother? Why?” Alina asked incredulously.

“I think she wanted to toughen me up. I used to be terrified of the dark and she was always annoyed with how long it took to put me to bed, so I guess it was a kind of immersion therapy.”

“How old were you?” Her voice was a horrifies whisper.

“Four, I think.”

“Did it work?”

He considered the question for a moment. “Well, I’m not afraid of the dark now, but it still takes me a while to fall asleep.”

Alina fought the urge to roll her eyes. “Not now. I meant back then.”

“Saints no.” He gave a slight chuckle. “I was even harder to manage after that… incident.”

Alina laughed, imagining what a terror little Aleksander must have been.

He rubbed his thumb along her jaw and her laughed stuttered. “Now I have a very serious question for you.” He paused for dramatic effect then said, “are you ready for some pizza?”

Alina’s laughter reignited and she batted him away lightheartedly.

“Ivan?” Aleksander asked suddenly and Alina looked around in confusion.

“Wha-?” She started to ask, but was interrupted by a low male voice.

“How can I be of assistance?”

Alina practically jumped out of her skin. “Saints! What the-?” She whipped her head around, but still couldn’t find the source of the voice.

“Order a large pizza. One half black olives and sausage, and the other half-,” Aleksander looked at Alina, expectantly waiting for her order.

She still had no idea what was happening, but obediently she answered “Pepperoni and green peppers?”

“Placing order now.” The voice said.

There was a little chiming sound and then the room was filled with silence.

“Okay, what in the Saints was that?” Alina asked.

“It’s my digital voice assistant.” He explained patiently, but she could see the way a smirk played at the edges of his lips. “I can ask it for information, organize my schedule through it, send and receive calls, order pizza, those sort of things.”

“And you named it Ivan?” The moment she said its name, Ivan was asking how he could be of assistance.

“I actually try to avoid saying its name unless I need it. The thing is very… eager. But yes, I did name it Ivan.”

The voice piped up again and Aleksander looked at Alina meaningfully. She returned his stare with one that said ‘That’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard, but whatever.’

They settled into an easy conversation in the short time it took for the pizza to show up and when it did they ate it straight from the box, not bothering with plates. It was good pizza and Alina found herself diving in for a third piece.

When they were done they moved to the couch and Aleksander put on a nature documentary. Volcra and Vo’ya also settled into an armchair together and quickly fell asleep. Alina tried and failed to take a good picture with her phone’s grainy camera so Aleksander snapped one and promised to send it to her.

The documentary was about some kind of rare deer. They were cute, but Alina was too preoccupied with the causal way Aleksander’s knee rested against her leg to pay attention to the film. The two of them were angled away from each other, putting too much space between their upper halves. Alina wanted to be pressed up against him so that her head rested on his chest. She wanted to be close enough to feel the steady rise and fall of his breath.

So she pulled on all of the inner strength and confidence that she had and shifted. Slowly she made her way along the couch, millimeter by millimeter, until their legs were flush and then even slower she _leaned_ until she fell into the position she wanted.

Once she was cradled against him she gave a little sigh.

Aleksander chuckled so quietly that Alina might not have noticed if she couldn’t feel the vibration through his chest. She tilted her head to get a better look at his smirking face.

“What?” Her voice was accusatory and her eyes narrowed with apprehension. _Does he want me to get off of him?_ She thought with panic. Had she completely misread the situation?

“I’ve just never seen anybody make a move so slowly.”

Alina flushed and tried pretend that it wasn’t a ‘move’ and she was just trying to get comfortable.

Her stutters were cut off by his lips pressed against hers. He arched his neck downwards and she twisted up to a better position to meet him.

Their tongues collided and their hands reached for each other. Aleksander deftly shifted her so that she was straddling his hips and she was more than happy to comply. It gave him perfect access to her ass which he griped through the thin material of the sweatpants he had loaned her.

Her hands coiled their way through his soft, freshly washed hair and the smell of pine needles filled her nose.

She had used his shampoo.

Well, obviously. But more importantly, out of her numerous options she had picked the same as him.

Which meant that she smelled like him.

The thought sent a little thrill through her and she reflexively arched her hips up and into him.

Aleksander moaned into her mouth and his grip on her butt tightened.

He kissed her like the world was ending and she was his last hope. His kiss consumed her and breathed new life into her at the same time. She was completely intoxicated on it. Unable to think of anything other than the feel of him on her skin, the taste of him on her tongue, and sound of their breaths tangling together in her ears.

And then his hands were roaming, reaching for a place only her hands had been before.

She gasped and her hands shot down to stop the movement of his.

“I’m a virgin!” Alina blurted out. The second the words were out of her mouth she wished she could shove them back inside, swallow them down, and never let them out again. She hadn’t intended to say them. Hadn’t wanted him to know. Because now whatever happened between them would weigh heavier that it should.

Or worse. He might not want her anymore.

Aleksander went completely still then leaned back away from her a little. His eyes were unreadable, but a furrow was forming between his brows. “But… just how old are you? You aren’t…” He trailed off, but it was clear if he was asking if she was even legal.

Alina groaned. “No! Of course not! I’m twenty-three.”

A lengthy silence passed between them that spoke more than if Aleksander had actually said something.

Alina turned her body away from him so that he couldn’t see the hurt on her face. “I should go.”

He didn’t say anything and she took that as a confirmation that she was no longer wanted there. She released her grip on his hands, swung off of him, and rose to her feet feeling about as desirable as a slug.

A soft but insistent hand closed around her wrist before she could step away. She paused and Aleksander ran a finger down the cut in her palm she had gotten the day of the wind-storm. It had mostly healed, somewhere between a scab and a scar.

“I never asked you how you got this.” He murmured.

Alina opened and closed her mouth, trying and failing to put together something to say.

Aleksander flipped her hand in his so that her palm rested upwards, cut exposed. He continued to run a finger across the little ridges of the the raised line and her skin tingled at his touch.

Alina had to fight the urge not to shiver.

“So you’re just going to ignore what I said?” She couldn’t look at the perfect planes of his face so Alina turned to the window. But instead of the skyline, the image of the apartment was reflected back at them.

She could see herself; small, hunched over, and tethered to Aleksander by his hand around her wrist. He was perched on the edge of his seat, hair disheveled by their earlier activities. His intense eyes found hers in the reflection.

“You were running away.” His finger trailed up her arm a little before making its way back to her cut. “You didn’t give me a chance to say anything.”

Alina pulled her hand away from him. He was right. She had wanted to run away. _Still_ wanted to run away from the awkwardness that was tightly wound around and through her. Instead she stayed rooted to the spot, unsure of what to say or do.

Aleksander sighed softly from behind her then rose to his feet. Warm arms wrapped around her and she leaned into the embrace until his cheek was resting against the side of her head. His eyes continued to capture hers through the mirrored surface of the window. She closed them so that she wouldn’t have to endure that intensity, but she could still feel his eyes on her.

“Alina,” his breath tickled her ear, “I don’t care if you are a virgin unless _you_ care. We can go as slow or as fast as you want. I won’t pretend that there aren’t _things-,_ ” he pressed a kiss to the top of her ear, “that I want to do with you. But I’m a patient man. I can wait.”

Alina was having trouble breathing. Her breath was caught in a messy web of anxiety and desire. “Wh-what kind of things?”

At the tremor in her voice, he pulled her closer to his chest and his teeth grazed the edge of her ear. “I think you know exactly what kind of things.”

She practically vibrated with desire at the words. The sensation was equal parts physically painful and pleasurable. Alina suddenly wondered why she was waiting. Aleksander was right there. Ready and willing and irresistible.

But no. _She_ still wasn’t ready and she wasn’t going to be tonight no matter how _excited_ she got.

Soon though. Soon.

Alina rotated in the circle of his arms and wrapped her own arms around his waist. She buried her face into his chest, too cowardly to say what she was about to say to his face.

“You really wouldn’t mind waiting?” The words were muffled by the fabric of his black shirt.

“Not if that’s what you really want.” He kissed the top of her head.

“Your hair smells like my shampoo.”

Alina chuckled weakly against him. “I know.”

“I like it.”

“Me too.”

~ ~ ~ ~

Alina spent the night wrapped in Aleksander’s arms on a bed that she thought might actually be the size of her bedroom. Volcra and Vo’ya cuddled up next to her instead of Aleksander and he scoffed at their obvious favoritism.

When Alina woke up the dogs were still there, but Aleksander was gone. She panicked for a moment until she recognized the heavenly smell of bacon and blueberry pancakes wafting down the hall. The pups also noticed and raced each other down the hall. She followed, rubbing the sleep from her eyes and giving her hair a few halfhearted fluffs.

She found Aleksander’s back turned to her as he set up a breakfast tray. As sneaky as she could she padded up behind him then hugged him.

“You ruined the surprise,” he said without startling.

Alina chuckled. “The same could be said about you! We could still pretend though. You want me back in the bed?”

He cocked an eyebrow at her pointedly until she recognized the double entendre of her words and blushed furiously.

Seemingly finished with the tray, Aleksander picked it up and instructed Alina to follow him with the coffee. They made their way back to the bedroom and ate their breakfast while sitting cross-legged on the bed. The dogs were puppy-eyed and banished to the floor, but Alina (not so secretly) snuck them a few bites of her bacon.

“Alina, I have a question I’ve been meaning to ask you.”

A whir of uncertainty went through her. Was he going to ask about the cut again, or was it the virginity thing, or something else entirely?

Her mouth was suddenly too dry to respond so she just nodded.

“I’d like to do a collaborative exhibit with you. A series of contrasting paintings for the gallery. Would you be interested?” His serious grey eyes bore into her.

Alina’s forehead creased with uncertainty. “I thought you said that you weren’t ‘looking to add any pieces to your gallery.’” She paraphrased him.

“I changed my mind.”

The way he looked as he said the words sent dangerous shivers down her spine. Alina had no idea how he could generate such intensity.

He trailed an achingly tender hand along her face.

“Say yes.”

Alina leaned into the touch.

“Yes.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ayyyyyyyyy SO CLOSE and yet so far away! Is it bad that I'm not even sorry? ^-^; To be fair, it's pretty canon for Alina to be hesitant about hopping into bed with the Darkling. lol
> 
> I hope you guys liked the pacing and flow of this chapter. It's a little bit different than the one's before I think. Oh and the smut. I hope you guys like that too!
> 
> In the next chapter we have some serious Nikolina content. You didn't think Alina (or well _I_ ) was done with him already, did you?
> 
> Comments and kudos are my fav and will make you my fav (maybe... I make no promises! XD) Thank you for the almost 100 (!!!!!) kudos and over 1500 hits (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) so far! I hope you have a nice day and thanks for reading!!


	16. Does It Ever Bother You?

Alina was on cloud nine again; making her way through the day with a permanent smile on her face and a permanent marker in her hand that left no surface un-doodled.

Alexei groaned as she drew a sun with sunglasses on his hand. “Not this again! I swear, Alina… I love you and I love that you’re happy, but do you have to make me so miserable in the process?” He complained.

In turn she swiped a finger across his nose and said, “Boop!”

“Did you just _boop_ me?” Alexei asked as if he couldn’t trust his own eyes and ears.

Alina just widened her smile and shrugged before turning to the next customer with glee.

She was still riding high on everything that had passed between her and Aleksander over the weekend. Sure there had been some embarrassing moments (all on her end), but she had come out of the exchange with respect, acceptance, and the promise of being featured in a very prestigious art gallery.

They had decided on a series of thirteen paintings in total. They would do twenty paintings, ten each, where they would paint the same thing but in their own contrasting styles. And finally they would collaborate on one giant painting of one of Alina’s sun woman. She was especially excited about that one. They had decided that she would have dark Zemeni skin. Alina had made sun woman of all skin tones and liked the results of all of them, but she couldn’t wait to have Aleksander’s input on how to make darkness glow. She was certain that his contribution would make the painting all the better.

They had already made plans for Alina to come back over to his house to paint in just a few days. Thursday couldn’t come fast enough.

“What is up with you? You’ve been all over the place these past few weeks.” Alexei cut through Alina’s day dreaming.

She had been thinking about the possibility of naked painting with Aleksander.

“Oh I don’t know!” Alina said blithely as she worked on a double cappuccino.

Alexei wiggled his way in between Alina and the espresso machine so that he was directly in her face.

“Spill it!” He demanded.

On a regular day that would have been extraordinarily dangerous for two reasons. For one thing the espresso machine was hot enough to cause third degree burns. And for the other? He had put himself within smacking distance of Alina.

Luckily for him Alina was in too good of a mood to be violent.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, Alexei. Be careful though. You know how hot this thing gets.” She side stepped her way around him.

“Pleeeeaaasseee?” He wheedled.

 _Oh what the hell_ , she thought. “You really want to know?”

“YES.”

Alina snuck a furtive glance around. Nikolai was currently on his break and she didn’t want to risk him hearing what she was about to say.

“Well,” She drew out the word for effect, “I might not be a ‘Little Saint’ for much longer. If you know what I mean.”

“WHAT?! ALINA! WHO?” Alexei screeched so loud that Alina’s ears hurt and most of the customers looked around in confusion at the unexpected noise.

There was a sudden clashing noise and Alina turned around to see an empty carafe on the floor and Nikolai’s figure retreating back into the breakroom.

_Shit._

“I’m taking my ten, Alexei.” Alina said and followed after Nikolai despite Alexei’s spluttering behind her.

The breakroom was so still and dark that Alina wasn’t sure if Nikolai had left through the back door.

“Nikolai?” She called softly.

“Yes Little Saint?” he said and walked out from behind a pile of boxes. Nikolai’s tone was light and cheery, but despite the carefree smile on his face, Alina could tell that he was unhappy.

“We should talk.” Alina said feeling wildly uncomfortable.

“About what?” Nikolai leaned against the wall.

“You know what.” Her voice was small with guilt and was having trouble looking at anything but the ground.

Alina had left this conversation for too long. She should have talked him much sooner. She should have told him that she wasn’t interested in anything other than friendship as soon as she started going out on dates with Aleksander.

He was absolutely silent.

Nikolai who was always making endless amounts of noise whether it was drumming on the counter, singing under his breath, laughing at a customer’s joke, or constantly pestering Alina was now completely silent.

Something in Alina’s heart twisted. She had messed this up and now she was going to lose an unlikely friend.

“I’m sorry, Nikolai…” She trailed off, not quite sure what to say.

“-but you’re with Mal now.” He finished her sentence for her.

Alina’s head snapped up. “What?”

“I knew I should have tried harder. I just didn’t want to overwhelm you and then you were just so obviously thinking of him.” He ran a hand through his hair.

“And well I… I didn’t want to…” he trailed off for a moment to look at her meaningfully. “Not until you were thinking of me instead of trying to forget him.”

“Oh.” Her breath caught in her chest. “Oh Nikolai. I’m so sorry… I didn’t mean to, but-”

He cut her off by holding up hand. “It’s okay Alina. You really don’t need to explain.”

She opened her mouth to say that she did in fact need to explain, because she wasn’t actually dating Mal, but she was sort of dating Aleksander. And either way she just didn’t see him as anything other than a friend.

But she was interrupted by Alexei calling out to her. “Ummmm Alina? Somebody is here to see y- Wait! That’s for staff only! You can’t-”

And then in a cruel twist of fate, Aleksander was walking through the door. He was holding onto the shirt and pants she had been wearing from the day before that he had promised to dry clean when the paint didn’t come out all the way.

His eyebrows raised ever so slightly when he took in the scene in front of him.

Alina and Nikolai were on opposite sides of the dim room, but it was still clear that Aleksander had interrupted something. His eyes settled on Nikolai and a grim recognition passed over his features.

“Sobachka, I didn’t know that you worked here. Your father didn’t say anything.” Aleksander said with a tight smirk.

Nikolai seemed to shrink before Aleksander and actually winced at the nickname ‘Sobachka.’ But then he was crossing the room quickly until he was in front of Alina.

“Alina. There’s something I need to tell you, and I’m sorry I didn’t before, but there just never seemed to be a good time.” There was a panic in Nikolai’s eyes that she had only ever seen once before.

It had been the morning after the terrible blind date when she and Nikolai had been hungover from the obscene amount of kvas they had drank. Nikolai had run into the breakroom in a panic and then…

Alina left the breakroom to find Aleksander in the line of customers.

And now that she really thought about it. Nikolai always seemed to vanish whenever Aleksander came into the store.

“Do you two know each other?” Alina asked with a growing feeling of unease.

Nikolai looked like he was about to respond, but Aleksander spoke first. “Of course. I work with his father, Mr. Lantsov.”

Alina laughed. “That’s ridiculous. Nikolai’s last name is Sturmhond. Right Nikolai?”

She turned to him, but Nikolai was silent again.

Alina looked between the two of them with confusion; Aleksander who looked like the cat who caught the canary and Nikolai whose face was very pale, like he might be sick.

“Nikolai?” She asked him again, almost pleadingly.

“I tried to tell you, Alina. I really did. But we just kept getting interrupted and-”

“But you said you were a plumber!?” Confused, Alina cut him off.

There was a quiet snort of disbelief from Aleksander’s direction, but Alina ignored it.

“Ah yes, that. I kind of panicked when I said that.” He gave her a sheepish grin. “The first thing that popped into my head was privateer, but that would have been too outlandish.”

“Your choices were between plumber,” she started to count the options on her fingers, “pirate, or the truth and you went with plumber?”

“Privateer.” He corrected her.

Alina gaped at him, her three fingers still suspended in the air.

And then the full weight of the situation sunk into her.

Nikolai was a Lantsov. His father actually owned the company they worked for. He was absolutely and utterly rich.

And he had lied about it multiple times to her face.

“I trusted you,” Alina’s voice was a whisper, but from the stricken look on Nikolai’s face she might as well have been yelling.

He reached out hand for her, to touch her shoulder or grab her hand Alina wasn’t sure, but she wasn’t having it.

“No.” She backed up a step. “You don’t get to do that. You don’t get to try and comfort me.”

“Alina, please!” He took a pleading step towards her.

And then, faster than Alina could follow, he was on the ground. Aleksander had stepped in between them and punched him down.

“She said ‘No.’” He glared down at Nikolai, one hand bloody and the other still clutching Alina’s clothing.

“Shit, Morozova.” He wiped at his mouth and there was a trail of blood on his hand. “What the fuck?”

Alina was now furious at the both of them. Nikolai for lying and Aleksander for punching him. She drew Aleksander’s attention away from Nikolai by snatching her clothes out of his hand.

“I can handle myself.” Alina moved in between them. “You gave me my clothes, now it’s time for you to leave.”

Aleksander’s face darkened, but Alina didn’t care. “We’ll talk about this later.” She said firmly.

He paused for a long moment, but finally said, “Yes. Later.” And then walked out.

The room was just as dark and still as when Alina had first entered it to apologize to Nikolai. But somehow everything had changed in just a few short minutes.

“So, how do you know Morozova?” Nikolai asked with an infuriatingly calm voice as he started to get up.

“Don’t talk to me _Sturmhond_.” She enunciated both syllables of the fake name with disgust. “Don’t talk to me ever again.”

Alina walked out of the breakroom, but when she got to the counter she kept going. She couldn’t keep working today, she didn’t have it in her.

“What’s going on? Where are you going?” Alexei called after her.

“I’m leaving.” She said flatly.

“Alina wait! You’ll get in trouble. The manager’s going to be here in a half hour.”

Alina gave a harsh, bitter chuckle. “Just tell him to take it up with the CMO of the Ravkan Brew. Or better yet, he can talk to _Mr. Lantsov_ in the breakroom.”

She shoved through the door and didn’t look back.

~ ~ ~ ~

When Alina got home early she found Mal resting on the couch, watching some kind of sports game. At the sound of her unlocking the door he turned towards her, but when their eyes met he looked back to the television and sunk down into the couch with a frowning sigh.

Alina knew that they should talk, sort out whatever was happening with them, but she was too tired to argue anymore. Her day was already filled to the brim with drama and she was beyond done with it.

So instead of saying anything she just flopped onto the couch next to him. He had been splayed across the majority of the cushions, but she wedged herself into the free space, not caring if they overlapped slightly.

It was how they used to sit when they were kids, unconcerned with boundaries. A tangle of arms and legs fighting over the same blanket or seat. It hadn’t meant anything romantic then and it was the same in that moment.

Alina just wanted to be close to somebody.

Somebody that she trusted.

Mal stiffened for a moment then relaxed into her. He let the arm he had rested over the top of the soda drape over Alina’s shoulder instead. In turn, she settled into him further so that her back was supported by his chest.

They stayed that way through the entire sports game, which Alina now recognized as soccer, and into the start of another. Neither of them tried to say anything and the only sound in the room was the murmur of the television.

Alina didn’t watch the game though, she had never been all that interested in sports. That was always more of Mal’s thing. Instead she let her thoughts roam aimlessly through the tangled streets of her mind.

“Does it ever bother you?” Alina asked suddenly, surprising her own self.

“Does what bother me?” Mal’s tone was softer than she had heard it in weeks, muffled into her hair. Alina wasn’t sure when he had rested his head on hers, but she found that she didn’t mind.

“Being who we were, foster kids, and who we are now, barely making ends meet?” She played with the ends of her sleeves absentmindedly as she talked. “You always just seem so confident that I wonder if it bothers you.”

He was silent for a long time and Alina wasn’t sure if he was ignoring her or if he had somehow fallen asleep.

“Of course it does.” He finally said. “I’m not like you Alina. You have this amazing ability to take everything in stride. While I have to just pretend like it doesn’t bother me.”

Alina twisted her neck so that she could see his face to see if he was joking. “What do you mean ‘I take everything in stride?’”

“You never let the label of a foster kid hold you back. You may not talk about it much. But when you do? You don’t mince words. You lay everything out on the table, take it or leave it.”

Mal shifted her so that she was sitting upright and their faces were on the same level. “You also do the best with any situation that comes your way without giving in, even if it would be easier.”

“Your room for example!” Mal became more and more animated as he talked. “You are always doing things with it to make it your own. Didn’t you drag your bedframe halfway across the city?”

“It was only six blocks.” She said not sure if she should be flattered or defensive.

He shot her an exasperated look then continued. “And you spent so much time restoring it where most people would have just given up. You do so much with what little you might have. Even growing up you would decorate whatever space you were given. It didn’t matter if it was a desk or a bunk or just a backpack. You always personalized it and made it your own.”

Mal shook his head with admiration.

“Or like with your art! You are always making such amazing art no matter what supplies you have! I’ve seen some of your coffee cup doodles. Or the painting you made for me? You said you made it with dollar store paint right?”

Alina nodded dully.

“And it’s amazing! I honestly feel bad having it sometimes when you could sell it for so much money or feature it in a gallery somewhere! Plus, you went to art school.”

Her face soured. “Yeah and I’m still paying off the loans.”

“That’s exactly my point! You took a chance. You may have had to take out some loans and work for a few scholarships, but you followed your dream. You’re fearless! And losing that job you had with the greeting card company might have set you back a bit, but I know you will bounce back soon.”

Alina brought her knees up to her chest and hunched her arms around them as she considered what he said.

“I do have a gallery that’s interested in featuring some of my work at some point.” She conceded in a small voice.

The grin he gave her was downright dangerous; open and full of what could have been mistaken as a particular type of love.

But it was gone as quickly as it came, replaced with a frown. “I’m not like that. I don’t try the make the world my own. I just adapt and try to be whatever the situation requires.”

Alina opened her mouth to protest, but he continued on forcefully. He wasn’t looking at her anymore, his gaze instead on the tight fist his hand made against his knee.

“I don’t tell people about being a foster kid. I don’t let them get that close. Sure, I don’t care about bringing them around the house, but I don’t tell them what it means to me to have a steady roof over my head. Even if it’s lopsided or falling apart, it’s still ours.”

His eyes found hers. “I’m so lost Alina. I don’t know what I want to do with my life. I didn’t go to college, I bounce from job to job, my relationships are shallower than a puddle, I spend most of my free time drinking… And all the while I just hide under all that ‘confidence’ that you think I have.”

Alina just sat there, stunned. She had no idea that Mal felt that way. Had no idea that he thought she was the brave one.

She took his fisted hand in both of her own and gently eased his fingers open. “I don’t know how much any of what you just said is true.”

Mal looked like he was about to protest, but Alina continued on anyways. “But, you are amazingly confident and _you_ inspire me. If I’ve seemed fearless, it’s only because I knew you would be there to catch me.”

She laced her fingers in his and they just looked at each other for a long moment.

“Why are we talking about this?” He asked her softly as he ran a thumb along her palm.

Alina’s feelings of betrayal and hurt reemerged with full force as she recalled the day’s events. Her face must have darkened, because Mal was suddenly asking her if she was alright.

“Yeah, I just…” She averted her eyes as she trailed off and her hand fell away from his. “I found out that a friend was keeping a secret from me that he shouldn’t have.”

“Alexei?”

“No.” Alina was hesitating, not wanting to break whatever tenuous peace they had just formed.

“Then who?” He pressed her.

“Nikolai.” The moment she said his name the air seemed to be suctioned out of the room.

Mal stiffened and drew away from her like he had been burned. “What did he do? Did he already have a girlfriend? I told you he was nothing but trouble.”

It was Alina’s turn to bristle with anger. “It’s not like that.”

“Sure it isn’t.”

Something seemed to snap in her. “Fine! You want to think that I’m doing shit with Nikolai when I’m not, then go ahead. If you are too dense to believe that I could only be mad because he broke my heart or something than that’s your problem!”

The way Mal’s brow furrowed in confusion only angered Alina further. “I’m not even dating him! Never was! Which is good, because I just found out that the entire time I’ve known him he’s been pretending to be somebody he isn’t.”

Alina deflated back into the couch and pressed her wrists into her eyes to stop the tears brimming in her eyes. “He’s a Lantsov.” She whispered. “He’s filthy rich and I let him into my shitty life and into my shittier home. And the entire time he seemed so level headed and accepting about it. _And I trusted him._ But now I know that he was just laughing at me the entire time.”

“Did he say that?” Mal’s voice darkened and he looked like he was ready to punch something.

“No, but he didn’t have to.” She said miserably. “He didn’t even tell me himself! I only found out because Aleksander caught him in the act.”

“Who is Aleksander?” Mal asked suspiciously.

Alina’s wrists twisted away from her face and she glared at him. “Why do you care?”

“Why are you being so evasive?” He said with the same pinched look he had when talking about Nikolai.

“I don’t have to tell you about all the men in my life. It’s not like you give me a comprehensive report on all the women _you_ date.” She shot back.

“That’s different.”

“Oh for Saints sake!” She threw her hands up in exasperation.

Alina pointed an accusatory finger at him. “You know what? I want you to tell me- _in detail_ ,” she jabbed the finger into his chest, “how that’s different! I want to hear exactly how sexist you are.”

“I’m not sexist!” He spluttered. “Look, just because I was right about Nikolai doesn’t mean you should be mad at me! Don’t shoot the messenger.”

“But you weren’t right about Nikolai! And you weren’t the messenger, Aleksander was.”

Mal opened and closed his mouth trying to find some sort of retort, but Alina wasn’t in the mood to hang on his every word.

“You know what, Mal? This conversation is over. I can’t talk to you when you’re like this.” She shoved off of the couch and made her way to the hallway. But before she passed through the doorway she paused, but couldn’t turn around to face Mal to say what she needed to say.

“I used to be able to tell you anything.” She braced a hand against the warped doorframe for support. “And now I feel like I can’t say anything to you without you exploding at me. I don’t know when or how that happened, but I hate it.”

She walked away to the sound of a soft “me too” that she wasn’t quite sure she didn’t imagine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Le gasp! Back so soon with another chapter? It's unheard of! lol I just could not wait any longer to reveal the Nikolai secret that I've been keeping since chapter 6 (10 chapters ago/ ~30,000 words ago!) it was honestly probs pretty obvious though. ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
> 
> Oh also! Here is a BONUS (not coffee) PUN that I couldn't find a way to work into the very serious chapter above.
> 
> Are you ready for it?
> 
> I guess that you could say Nikolai is a... NikoLIAR.
> 
> *Cackles to self for the next 80 years.*
> 
> This was a pretty heavy chapter, but I promise we will have a nice Alarkling fluff break next chapter. I _LIVE_ for your guys kudos and comments, so don't be shyyyy! ;)
> 
> Edit 11/26/17: Increased the number of paintings and removed the bit about the portraits of each other. It would have been cute, but I just couldn't fit the scene in once I got to later chapters.


	17. The Cellphone Struggle

“You’re mad at me.” Aleksander said.

Coming from him it wasn’t a question so much as an observation, his tone so unaffected that Alina wanted to strangle him. Even the plane of his strong back was relaxed and unperturbed as he filled a kettle with water.

“Of course I’m mad at you!” She glared furiously at his back. “You can’t just do shit that like.”

Alina futilely kicked her legs at the kitchen cabinets. She had decided to sit on the counter to give herself some sort of upper ground in the argument they were having, but it didn’t seem to be working. So now she was purposefully letting her heels dig into the dark wood of the cabinet, not caring if her shoes left marks on them.

But it seemed like not even mild property damage was enough to get under Mr. Morozova’s skin.

“It was necessary.” Was all he said in reply.

Alina seethed. Who the hell was he to decide what was necessary for her?

Aleksander reached up to grab a box of tea from the cupboard causing the fabric of his black button up shirt to bunch and pull. It made Alina feel a little hot under her collar just thinking about the slight movement of his body under his clothes.

And that just made Alina even angrier.

“Could you at least look at me when we have this conversation?” She snapped, hoping to remove the offending view.

Without a word he turned around and leaned against the counter, arms crossed. His cool grey eyes cut through her with smoldering intensity that made her breath hitch.

Alina realized that she should have continued talking to his back, because somehow she had forgot just how arresting the front of him was.

_Saints._

Her mouth went dry. And then he smirked.

“Oh shut up.” Alina groused at him and looked away. _I’ll never win this conversation at this rate,_ she thought to herself.

So instead of staring at him she looked out the window. Autumn was starting to give way the the chilly fingers of Winter and Alina guessed that it only a few weeks before the first snow would hit. Soon the sharp corners of the skyscrapers would soften until they almost resembled tall kulich drizzled with white icing.

A few moment of silence passed between them while Alina thought of what to say next and Aleksander set up the kettle on the stove. The gentle click of the burner filled the room in the absence of their voices.

“You know this falls under the category of an ‘out of the way’ gesture, right?” She asked him.

They had this conversation more often than Alina would like. It was sweet of Aleksander, it really was, but when he did things like open car doors for her, insist on paying for every meal, or insist she freely use his art supplies it made her feel weak, incapable even.

It would be okay if he offered first, gave her a chance to say no before he gallivanted ahead with his chivalrous gestures. But he purposefully didn’t do that.

At least he would cease and desist if asked. But it seemed like he was always trying to find ways around her objections to his over the top actions. If there was a loophole, Aleksander would find and try it.

It was infuriating.

And challenging.

And if Alina was being completely honest, it was kind of fun. As much as he was pushing her, she was pushing back. She found ways around his gestures and even prevented some of them.

She would do things like make sure she was walking slightly ahead of him so that she got to the door first and held it open for _him_. Or sneak in her own paint supplies to use. Or take him to a certain Shu restaurant where she connived with Tolya and Tamar so that she could pay for the meal in advance.

Anything and everything to try and stay just one step ahead of him. They were both competitive by nature and this was their little war, their little inside joke.

Of course, it stopped being cute when Aleksander did something like punch a man in the face for trying to apologize to her. She was still mad at Aleksander for that, although not nearly as mad as she was at Nikolai for lying to her.

It had been a month and she still seethed at just the thought of Nikolai’s betrayal. It was good that he had quit working at the café in favor of taking a more corporate position with Daddy Lantsov, because Alina wasn’t so sure she still wouldn’t punch him as well.

There was still a raw edge to her heart, the type that would cut your thumb if you ran along it absentmindedly. Which Alina still did with alarming frequency. There seemed to be little memories pinned throughout her days that instantly brought back memories of their friendship.

Motorcycles, tall glasses of water, brownies, fairy lights, froyo, the breakroom… too many things. She had opened up to Nikolai about the struggle of her life that she usually hid with such shame and the rich asshole had lied to her about who he was.

Never mind. Alina was 100 percent certain that she would punch Nikolai if she ever saw him again.

However, her continued contemplation of violence towards Nikolai was no excuse for Aleksander to act on it. Which was something that she had been sure to make crystal clear to him. If he was going to act like that then Alina didn’t want to keep seeing him. No matter how ridiculously steamy he was.

Arguing with Aleksander was always more difficult than it should be due to her inclination to stare at his various body parts until all she could think about was striping him down so that she could press kisses into the offending area. But she had to hold off on that.

At least until she had won.

“Alina, you needed a new phone. You said so yourself.” Aleksander pointed out to her.

“No, I _said_ that I was _thinking_ of saving up for a new phone.” Cautious not to look directly at him, Alina’s eyes shot daggers at the kettle instead. “I did not say ‘Oh, Aleksander! Would you pretty please buy me the most expensive phone possible and then transfer my number to it without my permission?”

“I wanted to surprise you.”

“No. You wanted to force me into accepting a gift that I never asked for.”

Alina continued to glare at the kettle and if it were a person, Alina was pretty sure that it would have curled up into a ball and started crying at the sheer intensity of the looks she was giving it.

Unless the kettle were Aleksander himself. Then it would probably just trail biting kisses along her neck until her scowl melted away.

There was a soft clinking noise of porcelain mugs against granite counter top and then an even softer sigh. Aleksander crossed the kitchen until he was standing directly in front of her. He hooked a finger under her chin and gently tilted her face so that it was level with his.

Alina continued to pointedly look out of the corner of her eye.

“Could you at least look at me when we have this conversation?” He said and though his tone was jokingly light, Alina could feel an edge of tension in it.

Still. She couldn’t look at him now when he was so close or she would most definitely lose. Alina smoothly slid her chin out of his hand. “You can’t just buy my affections, Aleksander. And you must know what a power imbalance it is when you buy me something that costs more than my monthly rent.”

He moved to grab her chin again, but she jerked her chin away with more force. “No, you’re older than me, you’re wealthier, and no matter what you say you are most definitely my boss. And when you do stuff like this, especially without my permission, it means more than you might realize. So yes, I am mad at you, because what might have felt like nice gesture to you actually came across as a possessive power play to me. And… it made me feel like shit.”

The words had been hard to put together and Alina’s voice was shakier than she would have liked, but they also filled her with a sense of empowerment. She had said what she needed to say even if she felt vulnerable exposing her thoughts to him.

And to Aleksander’s credit, he had patiently let her say her fill without interruption or interjection. Mal definitely wouldn’t have. Alexei probably wouldn’t have either. Genya might have, but only depending on how much she agreed with Alina. It wasn’t something that Alina really held against them, she was guilty of it too. But that just made Aleksander all the better for it.

Alina hazarded as glance at him now that she had said what she wanted to. Aleksander was frowning, a soft furrow forming on his brow and a troubled look to his eyes. There was a long pause between them until Aleksander finally spoke.

“That… was not my intention.” His words were slow and evenly paced.

“Oh, Aleksander,” Alina sighed out his name. “How did you think I would react?”

His frown deepened. “Favorably.”

Alina gave a startled little laugh at his blunt answer and when his dark eyebrows knitted even further together she laughed harder.

He was just too adorable sometimes.

So often, too often, Aleksander was stoic and imposing, hard to read and even harder to get to know. But sometimes his tender soul peaked its way through his crunchy exterior and those were Alina’s favorite moments.

Her laughter warmed the room and filled it to the brim. And if her eyes weren’t squeezed together with mirth, Alina might have seen that this was one of Aleksander’s favorite moments too.

When her giggles finally petered out and she opened her eyes she found that he had moved even closer to her so that her knees bracketed his hips. His face was close enough that she could make out each of his individual eyelashes.

_I love you._

Like a strong punch to her stomach or a heavy slap of wind at her back, Alina suddenly found herself wanting to say those three words that would change everything.

Instead, with a breathy voice, she said, “How would you have reacted if our positions were swapped?”

“I wouldn’t have looked a gift horse in the mouth. I would have taken the phone and run.”

He was impossibly close to her.

“I don’t believe you.” She replied.

And then their lips crossed the imperceptible distance between them and their bodies melted together.

“I’m returning the phone tomorrow.” She vowed in between kisses. Aleksander just made a tching noise in the back of his throat and kissed her harder.

They could have stayed like that for hours, slotted together like two pieces of a puzzle and exchanging kisses like air. But the insistently shrill cry of the kettle worked its way in between them. Alina tried to chase his lips with a mournful “nooo,” but he broke away from her to take the kettle off of the stove.

“Why are you making tea anyways?” She asked him grumpily, “wouldn’t you rather have coffee, Mr. CMO?”

“Well,” he poured boiling water into one of the mugs, “if we were drinking coffee I wouldn’t be able to say that you’re _tea_ -rrific, or beau- _tea_ -ful, or _tea_ -lightful.” Aleksander placed a heavy emphasis on each ‘tea’ as if there was any way Alina wouldn’t be able to pick up on the puns.

She groaned, but accepted the mug of tea he held out to her and replied. “I find your puns _tea_ -dious.

“Oh Alina, why can we never get oolong?” His face was deadpan, but his grey eyes glimmered.

“Ughh.” She swatted at him lightly.

_I love you_.

The words were there again, pressing insistently behind her lips. But it was too soon, wasn’t it? She still knew so little about this man. Especially when compared with the near encyclopedic knowledge of Mal that she carried around in her mind like a heavy brick.

Alina shook the thought off tried to stow it away for later. They weren’t even official yet. There had been no conversation nor labels, just unspoken commitments. For now, she should just enjoy his company and not get any of her hopes up.

_But it would be nice if he was mine. If I could casually call him my boyfriend when talking to Genya and Alexei. Or if was commonplace to exchange sleepy mumbles of ‘I love you’ on lazy Sunday mornings,_ Alina thought to herself. The kind of thoughts that no sensible intent could ever fully silence.

Aleksander’s own phone buzzed in his pocket and with a frown he fished it out. Whatever the message was it made him set down his tea so he could respond. His fingers flew rapidly over the screen as a slew of texts consumed his phone.

Alina sipped her tea as she watched with slightly detached concern. She knew exactly what would happen next.

Aleksander forcefully hit send on one last minute then looked up at Alina. His eyes were ever so slightly narrowed with irritation.

“That was-”

“Work.” Alina finished his sentence. “And you really need to go in now. At 6 PM on a Sunday.” She rolled her eyes. “What do you even _do_ at all of these last minute meetings? That’s the third time this week.”

Aleksander paused for a moment as if rolling a thought over in his head then his tone was serious. “Well I could say that the finance department seems to have collectively lost their calculators, or the Shu-Han menus need tweaking again, or that Mr. Lantsov keeps rejecting my perfectly adequate- no, _excellent_ \- ad campaign, but really I’m just plotting world domination and that gets very time consuming.

Alina choked a little on her tea with laughter. “Oh is that right? First you’ll seize the company, then all of Ravka and then the world?”

“Something like that.” He said and his tone was off for a moment. Then he noticed Alina moving to grab her jacket and get going as well. “You don’t have to leave. Stay. Keep on painting.”

“I- but- you’re leaving aren’t you?” Alina asked.

“Yes, but that doesn’t mean you have to. Besides, if we both leave Volcra and Vo’ya will be despondent. If it’s just me that leaves they won’t even notice- _little traitors_ ,” he said the last part under his voice.

Alina laughed, but it was slightly strained. She wasn’t really sure why Aleksander wanted her to stay. Did it mean something or was it just a matter of convenience?

As if reading her mind, he continued, “I’ll only be gone a few hours and then we can get back to painting.”

Alina nodded, the arrangement starting to make more sense. Aleksander then quickly left the apartment, a whirl-wind of efficient movement collecting his laptop and briefcase before throwing on a suit jacket and heading out the door. Almost as an afterthought he kissed Alina on the forehead and said, “See you soon.”

And then it was just Alina and the shadows. The apartment almost seemed to visibly expand around her in Aleksander’s absence and she shrunk into herself. It was an odd feeling, like she was on the wrong side of a fence and a security guard was about to drag her back to her proper place.

It was still hard to believe how rich Aleksander was and even harder to shake off the feeling that she shouldn’t be here. Especially when he bought her stupid phones that were bigger than her face, but thinner than a sheet of paper.

She brushed the thought away. She was returning the thing tomorrow and then everything would be right again in the world. Besides it wasn’t like Aleksander had always been this rich. He wasn’t like Nikolai, he had to work to get what he had. He also hadn’t lied about who he was.

Alina had once asked him how.

How had he gone from sleeping on the floor of a run-down studio apartment so that his mother could take the couch that was too short for him anyways and smelled like mildew, to having a skyscraper penthouse with a bed that felt more than spacious even when he shared it with Alina and his dogs. Although her phrasing had been much vaguer. It was him who offered up all of the details, down to the scent of the sofa that he still had phantom smells of when he drifted off to sleep.

She had never expected him to be so open and forthcoming about the details, even the grim ones, especially when he tended to be so tight-lipped about other things like work.

But tell her he did. He talked about how he worked so hard in high school that he often went weeks without more than two hours of sleep. How he graduated early and got a full ride to the Ravka U that then carried over to business school and a prestigious internship with the Brew. He spoke of dry ramen and bed bugs, of the time he fended off a mugger with a textbook that didn’t fit in his backpack, and so much more.

But strangely the details almost completely stopped at the internship. He just said that he continued to work hard and had good artistic ideas, that he got promoted fast. Alina shrugged that off though, she didn’t really like talking about work either.

As she made her way to the studio, she started to feel less out of place, the bright room always felt more welcoming and the familiar smell of paint comforted her. Alina started painting and before she knew it a few hours had pasted and the sun had set.

Her stomach growled.

Volcra and Vo’ya had fallen asleep, but stirred the moment she moved to get up from the painting stool. Alina pressed her fists into her low back and gave a contented groan as her spine popped. The dogs pawed at her feet as the sleepiness of their nap wore off and their own hunger set in.

“Okay, okay,” Alina said to them and went off to pour out some of their fancy dog food for them. She forgot where Aleksander kept the bag though and by the time she had pulled it out of the right cupboard she was exhausted and hungry enough to eat both dogs in one bite.

She grabbed a yogurt and a banana from the fridge, not bothering with anything that took preparation, and after that she settled on the sofa. _Just for a few minutes then I’ll get back to painting_ , she thought to herself.

But the moment Vo’ya rested her head on Alina’s lap and Volcra crammed herself under her arm, she was done for. In just a few minutes she was fast asleep, gently snoring away.

She didn’t notice when Aleksander came home. She didn’t wake he called her name. And when he found her on the couch and tried to wake her up to take her home, because she had work the next day, she just groaned “stay here with you” and fell back asleep.

In the morning she wouldn’t remember Aleksander picking her up or how she had burrowed into his chest to mumble ‘love you.’

She wouldn’t know that he froze mid-step to look down at her with an expression caught in some painful space between a deeply unsettling tenderness and an unexpected dread.

Alina would just know that she had fallen asleep on the couch and woken up snuggled up to Aleksander in his bed. The words _I love you_ would be on her lips, but she would be content in the knowledge that she hadn’t said them. Not just yet.

~ ~ ~ ~

After work, Alina went to the the cellphone store to return the phone. The shop was nearly empty, yet it still took twenty minutes for an employee to finally see to her. And when he did, the slightly sweaty teenager had no idea what she wanted to do.

“I want to return this phone and go back to my old one.” Alina’s voice was tight as she was barely holding back her annoyance.

“What’s wrong with it?”

“Nothing, I just don’t like it.”

“So you want to exchange it?”

“No! I just-,” Alina huffed out an irritated breath. She hated to do it, but she was going to have to ask for a manager. She tried to sound as polite as possible when she did so, but she could still hear an echo of Zoya’s bitchiness in her tone.

The manager understood what Alina was asking for on the first try, but then stalled when Alina showed her the old phone. The woman’s rounded face quivered slightly as she held back an obvious laugh at the age of it.

“I’m sorry ma’am, but I wouldn’t be able to reactivate that model.”

“So I’m stuck with the new phone?”

“Of course not! You still have two weeks to exchange it, are you sure you want to though? That’s our most expensive phone and we can’t refund the price difference if you pick something less expensive.”

Alina held back the string of about twenty profanities that came to her. It wasn’t the manager’s fault that Aleksander was such an ass.

She gritted her teeth. Alina told Aleksander that she was going to return the damn thing and so she would, lost money be damned.

It took a while before she finally settled on the replacement, a much smaller version of the new phone with half the features. But when she went to the counter to switch the number there seemed to be another problem.

“We need the original credit-card to do the exchange.” The manager said with accusingly tired eyes and Alina wanted to shake her a little and ask if she thought that Alina _liked_ spending half her afternoon this way.

“I don’t have the original card, my friend got me a new phone as a gift… without consulting me first.”

The other woman frowned. “He shouldn’t have been able to do that except… Wait. _You’re_ Alina? Wow, not what I pictured.” She turned over her shoulder. “Hey Mike! This chick is _the Alina_!”

_What in all of the Saint’s pants…_ Alina was beyond confused at this point, but the woman continued on, not noticing her puzzled expression.

“Your boyfriend was so sweet yesterday! Upgrading your phone and your plan as a surprise gift! I wish that I-”

Alina cut the woman off. “What do you mean that he ‘shouldn’t have been able to do that?’”

“Well, usually plans and phones can only be changed by the holder, but it was just so romantic of your boyfriend-”

“Boyfriend?”

The woman looked at Alina like she had just asked if water was wet. “Well, duh. He said his girlfriend had a really outdated phone that she wanted to replace and he planned to expedite the process.”

Alina was about two seconds away from unleashing the fury of a thousand very confused, but slightly elated suns. “So you’re telling me that you not only changed but my phone, but my plan as well, because someone who said he was my boyfriend wanted to surprise me?”

The manager blanched. “Well, yes… but-”

In her most assistant managerial voice, the one she used to get Alexei to scrap the gum from under the tables, Alina ordered, “Exchange the phones and downgrade the phone plan to what it was. Oh, and take off whatever credit card information he gave you so that I’m the only one who can pay the monthly bill and we won’t speak of this ever again. Okay?” Alina gave her a tight smile.

~ ~ ~ ~

<< Aleksander, you are an ass.

<< Also, there are easier ways to ask me to be your girlfriend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Special thanks to ZodiacAthena1903 whose kind comment gave me the final push to finish this chapter which had been sitting half completed for two weeks. 
> 
> Also note that the total chapter count has increased from 20 to 23, because for some reason I can't help but add more and more ideas to my final outline. ^^;


	18. Double Sided

“I have some paperwork for you to sign.” Aleksander’s crisp, business-like words interrupted Alina’s moment of relaxation.

They had been painting almost non-stop for the last few days in preparation for the gallery’s opening night tomorrow and she was exhausted. But when Aleksander had driven her home she had invited him inside, instead of going straight to bed like she probably should have.

He had been in and out of her rundown house before, but tonight was the first time he had spent any length of time there. She thought that it might be uncomfortable, but the way Aleksander’s knowing eyes took in her house put her at ease. They were the eyes of someone who understood what it was like to have less.

Too tired to make it all the way to her room Alina had flounced onto the couch, dragging her boyfriend with her, to make it clear that he wouldn’t be leaving any time soon. He allowed himself to be led and then to be used as a full body pillow without a word. And from the way he sighed into her as he played lazily with her hair, she guessed that he needed this relaxation as well.

If there was one thing that Alina had learned about Aleksander Morozova it was that he very rarely let himself stand still. Almost every moment of his day was filled with a driving purpose and he couldn’t let himself just be. If he was eating, he was reviewing documents for work. If he was painting, he was listening to the radio. If he was cooking, he was also talking to someone, whether it be a co-worker over the phone or Alina as she chopped vegetables haphazardly. Alina was pretty sure that she had even caught him practicing Fjerdan conjugations in his sleep once. Although the words had been mumbled and she didn’t speak Fjerdan herself.

So it always felt like a personal victory to her when she could get him into some semblance of relaxation. Even if she had to manhandle him a little to do it.

“Aleksanderrrr,” she groaned into her elbow. “No more art talk. I thought we agreed?”

He trailed a finger along her neck. “I agreed to no such thing. You must have imagined it.”

Alina groaned again. “But I _just_ got comfortable.”

“You’ve been almost snoring for the past fourteen minutes. I would hardly classify that as ‘just’ getting comfortable.” Ignoring her protests, he shifted her until she was sitting upright instead of splayed across him. “Besides we both have a busy day tomorrow and you need actual sleep.”

She gave him a half-hearted glare then climbed into his lap. “Okay fine, what is this paperwork you need me to sign?”

The new position gave Aleksander better access to her throat and he pressed his lips against it as he spoke. “It’s a contract.”

Alina giggled under his kiss. “ _Is it_ now?”

“You should look it over before tomorrow night.”

“Oh should I?” She said with an eyebrow waggle.

“Yes, actually.” And all of the sudden his tone had a serious edge as he adjusted her further away.

Alina couldn’t help the pout on her face. “Oh you were serious. Really, Aleksander? Can’t it wait? I’m tired.” She tried to nuzzle her face into his chest, but his body was at a frustratingly distant angle.

“This is important Alina. This contract outlines what is yours and what is mine in the exhibit which will mean a whole lot more if our work is successful. Which it undoubtedly will be.”

“What, you mean like money?” He had finally gotten her attention and now that she really looked at her boyfriend his expression sent a shiver down her spine. There was an odd sort of challenge in his gaze that was also tinged with possessiveness. Alina felt like she was being tested, but she wasn’t quite sure why or how exactly.

“Money, artistic property, intellectual property… accreditation.” He continued to stare at her meaningfully.

“Ah, is that all?” She said weakly. These were all things that they should have been talking about from the beginning, but only if the project’s purpose had been professional. And up until just now she thought it was only a casual collaboration. “Why not bring it up sooner then?”

“I’m bringing it up now.” He replied a bit too harshly than was warranted by the inquiry.

A flicker of anger coursed through Alina. “I _know_ you’re bringing it up now. My question is _why_ now?” _Asshole_ , she wanted to add, but held her tongue.

Aleksander’s eyes narrowed and Alina realized that hers were narrowed as well. _What is happening?_ She wondered and her stomach twisted with unease. Sometimes her boyfriend could be so distinctly odd.

Like the other day when he caught her casually messing around with his phone. He had walked away to use the bathroom, leaving his phone open long enough for Alina to get mischievous ideas. She had just wanted to change the background to a picture of the dogs and the screensaver to a picture of her face (eyes crossed and tongue out), she hadn’t even thought of snooping.

“And just what do you think you are doing?” He said with that same harsh tone and narrowed eyes, as he snatched the phone from her hands.

“Nothing!” Alina squeaked even as she realized just how guilty she looked.

There had been a long moment of tense silence as he scrolled through his phone. Then he angled the screen of his phone back at her. “What is this?”

“My face?” She answered, but it sounded more like a question.

“Why.” He asked, flat and unamused.

“Because I thought it would be funny?” As she said the words though, she realized just how not funny it was. She had basically broke into and graffitied the man’s private property. Sure the action was reversible, but the loss of trust was not.

There was an even longer pause, then, “Don’t do it again, Alina.”

The rest of the evening continued to be tense until Aleksander threw her a bone by saying “How did you even make that face?”

“What? This one.” She said, recreating the face and earning a soft snort of laughter from him.

The oddest part of the entire exchange though? Aleksander didn’t restore his phone to the original plain black screensaver and background. So Alina’s ridiculous face continued to greet him every time he checked his phone.

“I was busy with work and it took a while to put it together. Could you just look it over?” Aleksander stared her down as if he was challenging her to question him about it again.

“Fine, whatever.” Alina conceded. It was way too late at night for her to figure out the particular reason for this oddness, so she decided to take the path of lesser resistance. “Hand it over then.”

Aleksander reached into his shiny black briefcase and pulled out a thick stack of papers.

“Saints, Aleksander! That thing is like twenty pages long!” She inspected the pile. “Double sided? Really?”

He looked at her levelly. “It’s important to me. This collaboration is important to me.”

_You are important to me_. Aleksander didn’t say the words out loud, but it was what Alina heard in the silence that followed his statement. So she nodded and agreed to take the time to look over and sign the contract before the opening tomorrow.

“If it’s really that important to you, then I will. But I reserve the right to complain about it.”

He slowly raised an eyebrow. “Don’t you always?”

Alina squawked her indignation and swatted her free hand at him.

Faster than she could follow, Aleksander caught her hand with one of his own and deftly moved the thick pile of paper out of way with his other. Then he was moving over her so that she was pinned down to the couch.

Alina let out a little squeak of startled protest, but quickly found that she didn’t actually mind the new position. The two of them coiled together tightly and Alina’s hand found the nape of Aleksander’s neck. She stroked the soft fuzz she found there and the slight scrape of her nails against his skin caused him to moan and press into her even more.

Warmth bloomed in Alina’s stomach as her boyfriend’s hands and mouth roved her body. Aleksander seemed to be everywhere at once, at her lips, neck, thighs, collarbones, waist… her breasts, her ass.

But even with him all over her, she found wanted _more_.

The pleasant warmth of her stomach was suddenly a forest fire and her clothes felt too tight. She wondered if Aleksander felt the same way, if his skin burned where it touched hers or if he was lightheaded with want.

As if reading her mind, his hand found its way between her legs and she gasped.

What Alina felt was no longer a want. It was a need. “You remember those _things_ you said you wanted to do with me?”

He continued to press kisses into her neck, and she could feel his lips smirk against her skin when he elicited another moan from her. “Vividly.”

“Well, I think… I think I might be ready.” She had intended to sound sultry and inviting, but instead her voice was squeaky in her ears.

Aleksander stilled then pulled back so that he could examine her face. “Really?” He asked evenly. With his Saints damned smirk and quirked eyebrow, his face looked amusedly indifferent, but Alina could see the scorching intensity of his eyes and feel the insistent press of his hips against hers.

Her throat went dry and all she could do was nod.

“I need you to say it.” His eyes roved her face as if looking for any shred of hesitation or doubt.

_I love you, Aleksander._ Those words were there again, on the very tip of her tongue, just one breath away from tumbling out into the open into a place that they couldn’t return from.

But, no. It was still too soon, so instead she said her secondary truth, “I want you, Aleksander.”

“That’s very good,” Aleksander started to unbutton Alina’s shirt, starting from the top and working his way down. “Because I want you too, Alina.”

She though that he would stop once he reached the last button on her shirt, but his fingers continued on, finding the button of her jeans and undoing that as well. Instinctively she raised her hips so that he could pull down her pants. Once the fabric was out of the way, Aleksander slowly took in the length of Alina’s torso, his gaze hungry and predatory.

For a second Alina worried that he might notice that her chest was slightly uneven or that he might be disappointed that her underwear was plain and nude instead of lacy lingerie. But then he was all over her again, trailing fingers, burning kisses, soft touches, firm pressure, and sharp bites, and Alina forgot her concerns.

But only for a painfully short moment. Because before she could even get Aleksander’s shirt off as well, there was an all too familiar shuffling sound that set a thunderbolt of panic straight through her.

“Fuck.” She swore under her breath and tried to push Aleksander off of her so that she could grab her jeans. The shuffling sound grew louder and mixed with the soft scraps and clicks of the multiple locks on the front door.

 In any other moment she might have laughed at the slightly startled expression on Aleksander’s face as she scrambled to put her jeans back on. But somehow this moment was shorter than all other moments before it and she didn’t have the time to appreciate the rare emotion on his face.

“It’s my roommate. He’s well… you’ll see.” She hissed a hasty warning under her breath.

Aleksander arched an eyebrow, “Should I avoid making sudden movements?”

Alina huffed a bitter laugh as she finally grabbed hold of her jeans.

“Something like that- Aleksander, please!” Alina kept having to reach around Aleksander to do anything, because for some reason he didn’t seem to feel the need to move. She guessed it was probably because he had no idea what was about to happen, but Alina had a pretty good idea.

In all the time that she had been dating Aleksander she had been purposefully avoiding him coming anywhere near Mal. With the way he had been acting, around Nikolai especially, she didn’t want to risk him offending Aleksander or scaring him off somehow.

She had also been avoiding even mentioning him around Aleksander. He knew that she had a roommate who was male and a friend, but that was the extent of it. She hadn’t told him about the countless years she had spent moon-eyed over Mal, how they grew up together, or the way their friendship had been steadily slipping from her tense fingers. She wasn’t even sure if she had even given his name.

And now the two most important men in her life were about to meet and the timing couldn’t be worse. Especially with Aleksander continuing to kiss her as she tried to button up her shirt.

Alina thought she knew exactly how long it took to undo the ancient locks on the front door, somewhere between an eon and eternity. Alina was mistaken. The door opened and Mal shouted as it did. “You home, Alina? I was hoping to-” The words died on his lips once he took in the scene before him.

Alina jerked her face away from Aleksander and awkwardly tried to unpin herself from underneath him. The two of them were both breathing hard, Aleksander hadn’t bothered to smooth down his hair, and Alina’s shirt was askew by two whole buttons. There was no way to pretend that they hadn’t just been heavily making out.

 Mal’s face darkened to a molted red hue and for a second Alina thought he might actually explode. But after a few beats, his face went blank and he gave a stiff nod.

“You must be Aleksander.” Mal said in a voice that would sound calm to most, but Alina knew him better and could hear a rough catch in his throat. “Nice to meet you.”

Then he continued walking to his room and shut the door behind him without another word.

Alina sat on the couch, mouth opening and closing wordlessly as she tried to process what had just happened. She had expected yelling and shouting, explosive anger, poorly veiled threats. Not stiff silence.

She felt like she had just narrowly missed being hit by a car while jaywalking at night wearing all black clothes. Almost like she should have been run over for doing something as stupid as making out with Aleksander in her shared living space with Mal. But by some spectacular miracle, she had been spared.

That should be a good thing, so why didn’t it feel that way? Why was there a deep knot of frustration in her stomach where there should only be bubbly relief?

“Alina.” Aleksander’s smooth voice refocused her attention. “What’s wrong?”

“What?” She asked dumbly, then shook herself a little. “Oh, um. That just wasn’t… what I thought was going to happen.”

He gave her a look inviting her to explain further.

Alina sighed heavily not knowing where in the world to start. “It’s kind of a long, complicated story.”

Aleksander continued to stare at her, as if wordlessly challenging her. But she continued to shrug him off. “It’s late, can we talk about it later? Like you said, I need to get some sleep before tomorrow. Especially if I’m going to wade through that chasm of a contract.”

“Okay,” he finally conceded and Alina felt an anxious weight lift off of her shoulders that she hadn’t known was there. She started to breathe a sigh of relief, but then he continued.

“But, Alina? I don’t share.”

A shiver ran down her spine and she gulped. Looking into Aleksander’s chilly grey eyes, she knew better than to try and pretend like there wasn’t anything like that with her and Mal, even if it had only been on her side.

~ ~ ~ ~

Malyen Oretsev clenched and unclenched his fists, over and over again as he tried to calm his breathing. Blood whooshed in his ears and the edges of his field of vison darkened. He was pretty sure that this is what people meant when they said they were seeing red.

He had to be quiet though, he couldn’t let the sound of his barely controlled anger pass through the thin walls. He couldn’t give that man the satisfaction.

Mal didn’t know a huge amount about the man he had found tangled up with Alina on the couch, but he knew enough to hate him.

He hated the way the man draped his suit jacket over Mal’s favorite armchair, he hated the way his shiny black hair had been obviously tousled by someone else’s hand, he hated the way his eyes looked him over like he had found a mildly interesting piece of trash on the ground.

He hated the way his eyes looked over Alina, like she was his and his alone. The way he rested a casual hand on her thigh…

Mal’s breath hitched painfully in his chest.

What he really hated most of all about the man was the way Alina looked at him.

When Mal had opened the door and Alina came up for air she looked _dazed_ , like she had been forcefully transported across space and time into their drab living room. Like she needed the man’s lips on hers to breath, to live.

Malyen understood that look, it was one he made a point of seeing on every woman’s face that he took to bed. And he slept with a lot of woman.

Usually that look of sheer elation and longing filled him with pride. But on Alina’s face? Mal had felt sliced to his core with a hot jealously. There was a tight burning sensation throbbing in his chest, worse than any heartburn he had after a long night of drinking. And he had a lot of those too.

The pain had caught him completely off-guard and it was all he could do not stumble. Although why he was surprised anymore was beyond him. Alina had been giving him a fresh coronary almost every week for the past month and a half. Shouldn’t he have gotten used to the pain by now? Or at least become numb?

But despite the pain, at least he had been able pass by her with only a couple curt sentences and a nod instead of giving the both of them a front row seat to the simultaneous explosion and implosion of his heart. It had been so hard, so very very hard. But Mal had been trying his best lately, because Alina had asked him to and he was pretty sure that he would do almost anything for her.

“I used to be able to tell you anything.” She had said to him, her slight frame hunched over as she hovered in the doorway with her back to him. The hallway light had cast an eerie halo effect of shining frizzy hair around her head while keeping the rest of her in shadows. Mal had wanted to call her back to the sofa, back into his arms. But instead he had just sat there, his tongue as useless and still as a long forgotten skipping stone that had sunk to the bottom of a lake.

 “And now I feel like I can’t say anything to you without you exploding at me.” She sunk even further into herself, and he wondered how that was even possible. “I don’t know when or how that happened, but I hate it.”

“Me too,” he had said, sick with guilt. But his voice was so quiet that he wasn’t sure she had heard it. And if she had heard him, she hadn’t turned around.

Mal knew he had been messing up, that he had been hurting her lately, but he had no idea that he had lost her trust.

When had it happened? When he snapped at her for spending time with Nikolai? When he didn’t answer Alina’s call in the windstorm and she had cut her hand? He still felt bad about that. He tried to wrack his brain for the specific moment he had messed up, but seemed to be an endless list of possibilities that grew with every reflection he had. And with so many offences, how could he fix it? Fix them?

He had no idea, but he was desperate to find out. Because Alina was his family, his _only_ family, and he couldn’t lose that.

Couldn’t lose her.

But how could he hold on to her when instead of wiping the tears away from her eyes, he wanted to kiss them away? When he said that Nikolai only wanted to have sex with Alina, but he actually meant that _he_ wanted to have sex with her? Mal wanted to take Alina in his arms and unwrap her until she was shaking with need, until she made that face for _him_ and nobody else.

Not because he only wanted Alina for her body, but because he wanted all of her. Because somewhere along the line, while Alina had been losing her trust in him, he had been realizing he was in love with her.

And he was ashamed. So very ashamed that he would do that to her. Alina was practically his sister, so what was he doing?

Mal looked up at the only decoration in his room, the only possession that actually mattered anything to him. The painting that Alina had made for him. It was titled only one word, “Family.”

And so Mal was trying his best for Alina, to get back her trust. He wanted her to be able to tell him anything again. And if that meant respecting her choice of companion and biting his tongue, he would just have to do it.

Alina was Mal’s world, but he hadn’t realized the full depth of that world until it was far too late. So now he would just have to take whatever was left of it.

Mal thought he hated the man he had found tangled up with Alina on the couch, but he really only hated himself.

At least for now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wheeewww this chapter took me much longer than I thought it would! Funnily enough though, I actually had the easier time writing from Mal's perspective and I wrote it first. I may write from Aleksander's at some point, but I don't think I'll write from Mal's again.
> 
> In case anyone was curious, this was the vague outline I worked off of and I actually modeled it off of what I hoped your guys' reactions would be! lol was I close?  
> \- Huh. Why is Aleks being so weird about this paperwork? Very suspect, much foreboding.  
> \- That’s a weird story too, but… SQUEE he kept the picture!!1!!  
> \- Hmm Alina maybe you shouldn’t give up on this so easily- NEVERMIND. CONTINUE MAKING OUT PLZ  
> \- Yassss Alina get it!!! Finally!  
> \- DAMNIT MAL. You are the reason we can’t have nice things!  
> \- Oh, wait, he’s actually being chill… but now Alina is weird. Ugh can we not?  
> \- Nooooo don’t scare off Aleksander! Have very hot, very _loud_ sex with him instead!!1! Let Mal hear a real man do it! (•̀⌄•́)/  
>  \- :( Aww he left. Maybe next time? If not, I’m-a gonna hunt down this Smiling_Penelope bitch and _make her_ write more Alarkling smut.  
>  \- Wait- this is Mal’s perspective. ???? Who cares about him?  
> … I _guess_ he’s a little more likeable… maybe… He still better not end up with Alina though…
> 
> Anyways the next chapter is going to be opening night and you best know that I've got BIG plans!!
> 
> <3 Hope you had fun reading! Kudos and comments encourage me to no end! :3


	19. Aleks

>> Did you sign it?

<< All 36 pages. Initialed, signed, and drooled on.

>> Drooled on?

<< It was 36 pages!  
<< And I was tired…

>> I see.

Alina snorted a laugh at the short reply. She could practically hear him say the words. Slowly and evenly, in a way that made it clear that he didn’t in fact ‘see’ her point, but was indulging her anyways.

“What’s so funny? Lover boy cracking jokes?”  Genya craned her neck a bit as she wrapped a section of Alina’s hair around a hot curling wand.

Alina tilted her phone out of view. “Nosey much?” She teased.

Genya pouted and released the freshly formed ringlet. “So rude! Even as I do your hair and makeup for tonight.”

“You begged me to do this and you know it.”

“Yes, well, who is the one wielding the hot stick of metal?” Genya waved the wand around in the air threateningly for a moment. Then she went in for another piece of hair and her voice turned serious. “I am so happy for you though, Alina. You’re being featured in a gallery and you got yourself a boyfriend. But more importantly, I think that this is the happiest I’ve ever seen you.”

Alina tried to tilt her head forward to hide the sappy grin on her face, but was held in place by the section of hair that Genya was currently holding hostage.

“Stop moving! Curling your hair is hard enough as is without you getting in the way. And I’m determined to make these curls last longer than two hours this time.” Genya frowned at Alina’s hair like she was personally offended by its refusal to hold a curl.

Alina laughed and was about to respond when her phone buzzed in her hand. It was Aleksander again.

>> It’s started snowing. I’ll drive you to the gallery tonight.

The text message made her frown. There was no “would you like me to,” or “can I,” or even “let me.” Before she could respond, the phone buzzed again.

>> 7 PM  
>> You’re at Genya’s, correct?

Her teeth made a slight ticking noise as she clenched them together to bite back her sigh.

<< Yeah I’m at Genya’s, but I can walk. It’s only 15 minutes away.

>> It’s snowing.

<< I know.

>> It’s dangerous to walk in the snow at night.

Alina rolled her eyes. It wasn’t that dangerous. She had walked further and in worse weather before with no problems.

<< I’ll be fine.

>> You are being difficult.

<< I know you are but what am I?

>> Alina.

“Oh just let him drive you!” Genya gave her hair a little tug. “It’s sweet of him and you aren’t going to want to walk all that way in heels _and_ if you mess up this hair before the gallery doors even open I will hunt you down and kill you.” She brandished the curling wand again. “I can be _very_ creative with this thing. You know?”

Alina looked at her friend dubiously, not fully certain that she wasn’t kidding. She decided not to find out. “Oh fine,” she agreed as she texted Aleksander back.

<< Say please.

There was a long pause before his response. Enough time for Genya to pin the final curl in place and use up almost an entire can of some kind hair product that smelled a lot like the fixative spray Alina used for her chalk pastels. _‘It’s HAIR spray, Alina. I’m not some sort of barbarian.’_ Enough time for Genya to apply her makeup, from eyeshadow to foundation to lipstick with liner. There was even enough time for Genya to ‘bake’ her face. A process which involved copious amounts of white powder under her eyes and on her chin. Which was then inexplicably brushed off her face completely. Alina couldn’t tell a difference to her face before and after the power, but to avoid a lecture she pretended that she did.

It wasn’t until Genya started to coerce Alina into wearing a backless dress that he finally responded.

The dress was gorgeous, Alina had to admit. The fabric was inky black, slinky and silky in a way that caused the skirt to flounce around her thighs. And from the front it looked perfect. The neckline was a respectably high, but scooped in a way that hinted at cleavage and framed her collarbones nicely.

It was the backless part that was the problem. Alina looked over her shoulder to see her back in the mirror. It was almost completely on display, from her neck to the tops of her hips. “I can’t wear this. It’s too much.”

“It fits you perfectly though!” Genya wheedled as she adjusted the intricate pattern of thin straps that crisscrossed the expanse of her back.

“No.”

“Yes!”

“Genya. No.”

“Alina, _yes_. Aleksander won’t be able to resist you in it!”

The two women frowned at each other, Alina dubious and Genya unwilling to budge. It was at that point, as if in agreement, that Alina’s phone buzzed.

>> Please.

 A surge of victory ran through Alina. She took another look over her shoulder.

 _Aleksander does like black,_ she thought.

~ ~ ~ ~

The car ride had been tense for some reason unknown to Alina. She had tried and failed to carry a conversation with Aleksander multiple times, his responses to her questions vague noises or terse one word answers. It left her feeling uneasy, off kilter, and more than frustrated.

As they silently walked from his car to the back door of the gallery, Alina wracked her brain for a possible reason. But what could it be? She had signed the paperwork and brought it with her. She had even let him open the car door for her both upon entering and exiting the car. Normally she absolutely refused to, but tonight felt like a special occasion. Plus, she really didn’t want to break an ankle in her heels with all the snow around. She needed all the help she could get when she was in those things.

 Maybe it was because she made him say ‘please.’ But that was ridiculous wasn’t it? Aleksander wasn’t some petulant man-child. _Not like Mal_ , the bitter little thought crept its way into her head. But there would be no thinking of Mal tonight, Alina had decided. He had said that he couldn’t make it tonight, work as the excuse. And though he had looked sincerely remorseful about it, Alina still had her doubts. So she decided that if he couldn’t be bothered to show up in person, then he also wasn’t allowed to show up in her mind.

But the question still remained. Why was Aleksander acting so odd? Odder than usual, that is.

Alina inspected his profile blatantly as he unlocked the back door, searching for some sort of answer in the perfect planes of his face. There was no need to be shy or secretive about it. Aleksander had hardly even glanced her way that night. Even as he had opened the car door for her, he had tilted his face away as if there was something fascinating in the distance.

It hurt.

She hadn’t let Genya put eight pounds of makeup on her face or squeeze her into the scandalous dress for no reason. And the bastard couldn’t even be bothered to look at her for more than two seconds.

_Just like Mal._

The thought turned her stomach, sharp, sudden, and painfully. She pushed against it violently in her mind, but the thought that took its place was even worse than the last.

Maybe he was tired of her. Sick of waiting for something that seemed like it might never happen. He _had_ been awfully patient for a man of his age and looks…

She stepped over the threshold after him, then turned around to shut the door carefully. It tended not to fully close and despite how well behaved Volcra and Vo’ya were, Alina still worried about them getting out. It didn’t matter so much when the dogs weren’t at the gallery, which unfortunately they weren’t tonight, but it was almost a force of habit now for Alina to twist the handle until the lock clicked audibly into place.

She was so caught up in her own musings, that she didn’t notice that Aleksander hadn’t kept walking into gallery or that he had turned to face her. So when she turned to keep on going she ran face first into his chest.

He caught her as she stumbled and his strong arms held her in place, close to the length of his body. And then his lips came down on hers, the force of it pushing her into the door that she had just closed. He just barely caught the back of her head, providing some cushioning, before it made contact with the door.

“You,” he breathed in between his rough kisses, “are driving me insane.”

He ground his hips into her and she could feel how hard he was already.

Alina jerked her head back in surprise. “But you’ve hardly looked at me tonight…”

His laugh was harsh, almost agitated. “I had to drive, Alina. Do you know how hard it was to concentrate on the road, when you were sitting right there, looking like that? How hard it was to leave you last night after you said you wanted me? I had _things_ to do today, people to meet with, business to conduct. So. Many. Things. And all I could think about was _you_.”

Aleksander pushed her against the door again with his harsh kisses. His tongue parted her lips and she accepted it eagerly.

She was finding it hard to think herself.

“Do you know just how perfect you looked last night, breathless and flushed underneath me? I could spend days trying to capture it with paint and I wouldn’t even come close. Do you know how frustrating that is?” There was a rough edge to his voice that caused a shiver to go down her spine.

He captured her bottom lip in his teeth and for a second Alina was worried he was going to draw blood, but he let her go after a brief nibble that had a moan catching in her throat.

There was a possessiveness in his touches that boarded on desperation. Like he thought that she might decide to run at any moment. And wasn’t that the truth? The two of them never seemed to be quite on the same page. They were dancing together, but on different beats. And the misunderstanding and uncertainty of it all scared Alina, made her skittish.

Aleksander’s hands gripped her tighter, one at the back of her head and the other at the small of her back, pulling her even closer.

Alina pushed her hands against his chest, gentle but firm. “Aleksander, wait.”

There was a flash of frustration in his eyes, a moment of irritation that was clear before he settled his features into the emotionless mask he so often hid behind.

“You’re being too rough, holding me too tight. I’m right here, Aleksander, I’m not going anywhere.” Alina cupped a reassuring hand to his jaw. “I’m not running anymore.” She stared into his guarded eyes and suddenly knew what she needed to say.

“I love you.”

He just continued to stare at her, eyes still guarded.

Alina’s heart fluttered nervously in her chest. It needed to be said, she was sure of it, but that didn’t make the fear of rejection any less. She searched his grey eyes, the color of a troubled sea before a great storm.

Aleksander closed his eyes and a slight furrow formed between his brows. “Alina,” Her name was a yearning sigh on his lips. “I love you too.”

His lips came down on hers again, but this time the kiss was gentle and lingering. Instead of gripping, his hands now cradled her with soft strokes. And then he picked her up gracefully, as if she weighed of gossamer. Her legs wrapped around his waist instinctively and he carried her from the back storeroom to his office with ease. He was even able to kick the door shut behind him, all without breaking stride or the hold his lips had on Alina’s own.

Normally Alina liked to take the time to look over Aleksander’s office. It was like his apartment, dark in its modern décor but still well lit. But unlike the apartment he was constantly changing the art in it. People were always offering up their art for the Morozova Gallery and his office acted as overflow space for things that he liked, but didn’t think would sell well. So the pieces were usually edgier, odder, or just downright weird.

But the paintings on the walls could be Van Goughs, Picassos, Gauguins, Kahlos, or Monets and Alina wouldn’t care. Not one bit. Not with the way Aleksander Morozova was kissing her.

He carried her to his desk and set her down upon it. Meticulously neat piles of papers shifted and cascaded to the floor in messy heaps, but Aleksander didn’t stop kissing her.

His hands gripped along her thighs, pushing away the fabric of her dress as they moved upwards. It was a purposeful movement, slow and steady as his fingers crawled along her skin.

“I _knew_ you would look good in black.” He growled into her ear as his hands found their target. His thumbs hooked under the band of her panties and he pulled them down to her knees with one practiced movement.

Alina gasped, startled by the rapid transition from wearing underwear to having them pool around her ankles. But with Aleksander’s mouth on hers she found herself quickly recovering. She kicked her feet a little to get rid of the fabric once and for all.

 _Yes. Finally._ Was all that she could think of as her legs wrapped their way around Aleksander’s waist again to pull him closer. Twenty-three years was far too long to wait, but now that it was here, that it was _him_ , Alina found herself so certain. She was ready. No more interruptions, no more doubts or hesitations.

So when Aleksander’s fingers found their way to a new target Alina let herself be parted easily and entered willingly.

Alina had spent an inordinate amount of time studying those long, narrow fingers. She knew the way they curled around a steering wheel or how they bunched along the handle of a paintbrush. She had watched in awe as he expertly chopped vegetables for their dinner, one hand slightly curved as it held down the produce and the other gripped around the knife with a confident pressure.

Alina had even studied them when she should have been sleeping. She liked to watch the way one hand would twitch against the sheets while the other slowly gravitated towards her. She would trace the clean lines of them with her eyes and wonder at all of the things that they could do.

And now he pressed them into her. She could feel the slight dragging sensation of his knuckles as they moved in and out slowly. Alina’s hips bucked forward and her head fell back with the pleasure of it. If it weren’t for his other hand steadying her at her lower back she would have fallen backwards off the desk.

“Ah- Aleks- Aleksander!” Her ragged breath caused her to stutter over his name. Had it always had so many syllables?

“Yes,” He punctuated the word with a deeper thrust of his fingers, “call me Aleks. I want to hear you scream it.”

Alina’s whole body seemed to tremble with agonizing pleasure. “Aleks,” she whimpered.

“Louder.”

“Aleks.”

“ _Louder_.” Aleks’ voice was a firm command. His fingers worked faster and faster inside her and there was a tension curling in her center tighter and tighter as he did.

She continued to say his name, over and over again, each time more desperate than the last until she was practically sobbing it. All the while his lips trailed their way up her neck, down her shoulders, and along the swoop of her neckline.

When Alina came the tension didn’t leave her fluidly or suddenly. It hitched its way out of her like a finger running along a ribbed surface, a spring arching down the stairs, or the stuttered motion of cogs on a gear. Her hands frantically gripped at the lapels of his suit to keep her upright as the last of the spasms rocked their way through her.

She cried out and knew that she was probably being too loud, that she should calm down, but she was far from finished. If anything the release had only made her yearn for more.

Feeling bold with desire, Alina reached for the buckle of his pants. Still, even when riding the high of her orgasm her hands shook as she tried to undo it. They fumbled over the black leather and Alina could feel a flush of embarrassment spread over her cheeks. She made a frustrated noise in the back of her throat and tried it again.

Alina felt like inexperience was written all over her; in the shake of her hands, the clumsiness of her kisses, or nervous edge of her voice. Her world narrowed to what should have been the simple task of unbuckling a simple belt and everything suddenly seemed to hinge on the action.

Large steady hands covered her trembling small ones.

“Let me help you,” He said calmly as her guided her hands.

Alina flushed even more, but let herself be led. It was still a clumsy process, four hands working to do the job of two. But when the leather finally came free, Alina gulped at the way Aleks’ pants rested lower on his hips without the added support.

She pulled him back towards her and their hips met in the middle. There were just a few layers of fabric left to push aside and Alina pulled at them eagerly. They only just barely remembered the condom. She pulled it from her purse which had blessedly ended up within reach on the desk when Aleks had deposited her there. Thrusting it into his hands, she trusted that he would knew what to do with it.

And then he was inside her and-

_Oh._

_I didn’t know._

Although what she didn’t know, Alina wasn’t sure. That she would feel so filled? That her breath would catch in her throat every time Aleks’ eyes met hers? Or that each touch would only make her want _more_?

But it really didn’t matter what she didn’t know just then. She was overwhelmed with sensation as Aleks rocked into her. Slowly at first, letting her adjust to the stretch and then gradually faster until pace became frantic as they moved against each other.

“Alina.” His voice was raw, his eyes were dark with lust, and his hair was mussed from her eager hands. It was the most undone that Alina had ever seen him.

They encouraged each other with biting kisses, trailing nails, and strained utterances until the coil that had wound its way around them finally sprung free.

This time Alina’s orgasm rushed over her strong, fast, and unexpected. Her back arched and her hands fell away from Aleks so that she could keep herself propped up on the desk. He gripped her hips roughly, holding her in place while he continued to rock into her for a few more deep thrusts until he was spent as well.

They stayed that way for a long moment, still tangled up in each other. Their heavy breathing, the only sound in the quiet room. The rise and fall of their chests as they struggled for oxygen the only movement.

 _Well so much for being a virgin._ Alina smiled at the thought and absentmindedly pushed a curl out of her eyes. Or what was left of a curl…

 A hysterical giggle escaped Alina unexpectedly, startling Aleks a little which only made Alina laugh in earnest.

“What’s so funny?” A smile quirked at Aleks’ lips.

“Genya is going to absolutely murder me.”

~ ~ ~ ~

It was already two hours into the event and Alina’s eyes were still bugging out of her head at just how many people had shown up. They huddled in groups, strolled along in pairs, and stood by themselves gawking at the art. There was no corner of the gallery that wasn’t filled to the brim with them.

And they were all there to look at Alina’s art.

Or really Aleks’ art and hers by extension, but there they were none the less. And even if the Morozova name had drawn them to the gallery there seemed to be an equal divide amongst the paintings regardless of the signature at the bottom right corner.

There was a part of Alina, a quiet but persistent part, that said nasty things to her in the back of her mind, that thought that nobody would be interested in her art. That Aleks was wrong when he said her work would be popular. She had pictured everyone on Aleks’ side of the exhibit with a clean line separating it from her empty side. She imagined the snide whispers of people who thought Aleks was only featuring her art to get in her pants.

But there had been only warm praise and adulation over her art. As Alina wandered through the gallery she could hear snippets of wonderful conversations about composition, color, and context. She listened as people dissected her work and put it back together in a way that meant something to them. She listened to the sound of her art touching others.

No more permanent marker doodles on disposable coffee cups.

Although wasn’t it funny? That was how it had all started.

_‘Nice doodle.’_

“You’re smiling.” A warm voice said in her ear and despite its familiarity, Alina jumped and stumbled over her heels. Aleks’ sturdy hand reached out to stabilize her. She blushed when she thought of the things he had done with that hand only hours earlier.

“Of course I’m smiling! I can’t believe how many people are here.”

“I can.”

Alina just smiled larger and rolled her eyes a little at the statement, still not quite ready to accept the compliment.

“I’m serious, Alina. I knew that this exhibit would be a success, that _we_ would be a success.” There was intensity to his tone that wreaked havoc on Alina’s heart rate. She found herself wanting to jump the man then and there, demanding he follow her back to the office for another round. The gallery be damned.

Her eyes must have darkened with desire or her lips parted with a lustful sigh, because he leaned into her ear to whisper. “Later, Alina. We will do more, so much more, later. Until then, patience.”

Alina tilted her face up to murmur into his ear as well. “I don’t recall very much patience earlier this evening.” She teased him with quick kiss to the angle of his jaw then turned into the crowd with the intention of mingling. But as she moved through clusters of people, she spotted a familiar shade of auburn hair and made a beeline for Genya instead.

“I’m still mad at you.” She huffed the moment Alina was in earshot.

“I’m sorrrrryyy!” Alina whined in reply and fake pouted. “But can you really blame me?”

Genya’s eyes narrowed at her, but the irritation quickly dropped from her face and she was laughing. “No, I guess I can’t.” She raised a hand to adjust Alina’s hair and sighed. “It is a pity though, I tried my best to restore them to their former glory, but… wow girl. Just wow. I can’t even _imagine_ what you two got up to! And in exchange for all of my hard work I will demand details later. _All of them._ I’m talking play-by-play here.”

“Never!” Alina blushed.

“Oh c’mon! You know I’m in a drought. Take pity!”

“But I thought- isn’t David your date tonight? Isn’t he here?”

Genya sighed. “Oh he’s here. And as oblivious as ever. He ran off to go talk with the caterer. Something about the consistency of the whipped honey on the eclairs? I don’t know.” She heaved another gargantuan sigh. “I just don’t think he’s into me.”

“But the kulich-”

“- is a lie.” Genya cut her off bitterly. “Or at least, not the wildly romantic confession I once thought it was.”

“He came out with you tonight though.” Alina tried to point out. She had seen the way David looked at Genya. Or, more accurately, the way that he briefly glanced up at her on rare occasions.

“Yeah, maybe. As a _friend_.”

“Did he say that?”

“Well no…”

“Then what makes you think that?”

Genya guiltily looked off to the side. “I maybe might have said it? He didn’t want to go out! So I got desperate and said that going out is what friends do as like a… thing.”

Alina groaned. “You have to just lay it out for him Genya. Be blunt. Ridiculously so. Otherwise your drought isn’t going to end any time soon.”

Genya looked absolutely miserable and Alina was about to dive in for another pep talk when something else caught her attention.

A grating laugh carried across the room and Alina glanced over looking for the owner with an odd feeling of dread. It was the clothes she noticed first, internet meme level preppiness. Then the eyes, so sleepy that they were almost completely shut. Alina could feel her insides shrinking with revulsion.

The douche from the disastrous Tinder date. What was his name again?

Vasily.

He had mentioned that he frequented art exhibits. How could she have forgotten that?

Alina dove behind Genya, using her as a human shield.

“What are you doing?”

“Hiding.”

“From?”

“Do you remember that really bad Tinder date I had?”

“No way! Where?!” Genya gasped with more delight than any true friend should have.

“Shhh! He’s right over there.” Alina pointed across the room miserably.

“Who’s right over where?” David popped into the conversation. It was the most Alina had ever heard him say unrelated to baking.

“Alina’s terrible Tinder date! Remember, the one she threw candied fruit at?”

“Genya!” Alina bemoaned as her friend pointed out the man in question. “You told David?”

“Genya’s told me all about your love life.” David said in a matter-of-fact tone. “But I thought you said that she was dating other Lantsov brother. Nikolai, not Vasily.”

Alina and Genya both stared at David with gaping mouths. Alina’s was horrified. Genya’s was downright gleeful. Shocked, yes. But also very, very gleeful.

“But- he can’t be a- he looks nothing like-,” Alina spluttered.

“Well I wouldn’t think so. Apparently they don’t have the same father. Vasily is a Lantsov by blood. Nikolai is a Lantsov by name.” David continued to speak in his usual detached tone. “I thought everyone knew that.”

Genya laughed, “You are just full of surprises aren’t you?”

“I think I’m going to be sick.” Alina said.

“Oh you’ll be fine!” Genya clapped her on the back. “It’s your night. Go have fun! Mingle!”

“I’m pretty sure that those two are mutually exclusive.” Alina mumbled, but Genya’s attention was already lost. She was focused on David now, pestering him with questions about what other gossip he might know.

Alina rolled her eyes, but smiled at the two of them. She was certain that if the two idiots actually talked about what they were to each other, then their problems would be solved. It was kind of sweet in a way.

She wandered off into the crowd, away from the direction of Vasily’s obnoxious laughter. Genya was right. It was her night and she wasn’t going to let an Lantsov’s bring it down for her. Besides, she was sure that she would spend more than enough time agonizing over it later.

Alina was surprised to find that there were quite a few people who were interested in talking with her. Some even handed her their business cards and she found herself being slightly embarrassed not to have ones to give in exchange. Most of the people were other artists or art enthusiasts. But a few were gallery owners, interested in snagging her work for their own. Alina felt a strong rush of vindication when she got offer from a gallery that had previously refused to even look at her portfolio.

_Jokes on them, suckers._

“You’re awfully popular.” Aleks’ voice was back in her ear again, sending shivers down her spine instantaneously. He gestured to the business cards she had clutched in her hands.

“Jealous?” She teased then splayed the cards in her hand and fanned herself.

“Not one bit.” He held her close to him with a hand at the small of her back. “I have you right where I want you.” He picked a card from her fan and sneered at it for a moment before dropping it on the ground.

“Aleks!” She scolded and bent to collect it from the ground. “Don’t be rude!”

She turned to him, expecting some sort of witty rebuttal. Instead she found blazing eyes in a hungry face.

Alina laughed nervously. “Patience,” she reminded him.

He gave her a long lingering stare that set fire to every part of her body that it touched upon. “If you insist.”

He walked off and Alina had to fight the urge to shout ‘but I don’t!’ after him. She wondered if there was some way to end the event early, because she was eager to get to bed.

Very eager.

~ ~ ~ ~

There was an hour and twenty minutes until the party would be over. Not that Alina was counting or anything.

It was getting late in the evening and all of her friends who said they could make it had come and gone. Which wasn’t very many people, really just Genya, David, Alexei, and a few old art school classmates, but Alina was pleased none the less.

Although she was less than pleased when Genya and Alexei teamed up in an elaborate ploy to take a bad photo of Vasily to sell to the tabloids, but luckily Vasily left before it could be initiated or he saw Alina.

She accepted a flute of champagne from a server and sipped on it absentmindedly. She was probably two drinks too far in already, but she was tired and the bubbles seemed to help keep her awake.

“Hmph,” a throat cleared beside her and Alina turned to find herself face to face with Baghra. There was a flutter of panic in her chest. She had been back to the diner with Aleks a few times, but despite the sweltering heat of the place Baghra still hadn’t warmed up to her.

“Come with me, girl. We need to have a little talk.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alternate title to this chapter “The Kulich is a Lie"
> 
> Whew, I hope that you liked this chapter and I'm sorry it took so long to write! Hopefully the sex scene isn't totally awful. lol I blushed my entire way through it, all the while having an existential crisis over what makes something explicit vs mature and whether or not I could use the words 'clit' or 'fingering' in a sentence without dying. (turns out I can't)
> 
> Anyways, kudo's and comments are greatly appreciated! They really encourage me to write (and write faster lol). Also if you see any typos let me know, I just wanted to get this up already so I might have rushed it!


	20. HUMNBRD

Alina ran, ignoring the sharp sting of winter against her exposed skin and the precarious way her heels slid on the icy cobblestones. Her direction was random, her breathing erratic. There was only one thought in her head.

 _Get out. Get out before he can see you cry_.

Because of all of things Alina had offered up to Aleksander Morozova, he wouldn’t have her tears too.

~ ~ ~ ~

Twenty Minutes Earlier

Baghra led the way through the crowded gallery, moving with a startling amount of speed despite the cane she leaned on with every other step. Alina had seen her use it from time to time, usually when there was a lull in customers and she didn’t need to carry a carafe of coffee or tray of food. The cane had only further mystified her estimated age in Alina’s head. She supposed that one could need a cane at any age, but the way Baghra used one reminded her distinctly of an eighty-year old woman. She had once asked Aleks how old Baghra was, only to get a quirk of his lips and a soft scoff of laughter from him.

And Alina knew better than to ask Baghra herself.

But as they weaved through the crowd, Alina’s musing’s on the woman’s age faded away to a growing horror at their intended destination. She was pretty certain they were headed for Aleks’ office.

Sure enough they passed through the staff door that almost seamlessly rested in the wall, in a way that always reminded Alina of a secret passage way. They headed down the short hallway, past the bathroom door on the right, past the storage closets on the left, and then stopping short of the hopeful door that led to the storeroom and taking the last door on the right into to his office.

The fresh memories of the time she had just spent with Aleks in that room flitted across her mind. It was like a transparent image overlapping her current reality. She could practically picture the way he had held her shaking body as he rested her on the desk, their heavy breaths falling in and out of sync as they moved together. A desk that Baghra now leaned against to take some of her weight off of her feet and her cane.

Alina’s face had to be beet red at this point, but she tried her best to push aside the steamy memories and council her face into a mild interest more suited for whatever talk her boyfriend’s mother wanted to have with her. She must not have done a very good job though because Baghra sighed as she took in Alina’s appearance.

“How could you have been so incredibly stupid?” She asked in a voice that, despite the cutting words, was almost conversational, disinterested.

Alina’s head retracted back in surprise and her brow crinkled with confusion. “I.. what?”

“Did you even glance at it before you signed it? Or did you just blindly accept the conditions like you were making some sort of social media profile or whatever it is you kids do these days?” Baghra’s clear grey eye’s bore into Alina and distantly she recognized them as Aleks’ eyes.

Alina blinked a few times before she answered, “I don’t know what you-” Alina cut herself off once she realized what Baghra had to be going on about. “Oh, the contract? Of course I read it.”

Baghra made a tching noise in the back of her throat. “More like skimmed it, I’m sure. Unless you’re a complete idiot.” She turned to the desk and shuffled through a pile of papers that Alina recalled picking up after she had knocked them to the ground with her ass. “Are you?”

The fire of embarrassment that spread across Alina’s cheeks became fueled with irritation. She crossed her arms petulantly. This was her night and she didn’t want to spend it cloistered away with her boyfriend’s caustic mother. “Look, I have things I need to be doing. What did you want to talk about? Or did you just bring me back here to insult my reading skills?”

Baghra sneered in a way that made her look unsettlingly similar to her son. “Oh? What things? Talking up your work with potential buyers? Schmoozing other gallery owners? Reveling in your art’s success?”

Alina’s gut clenched at Baghra’s tone, but instead of crumbling into herself she found her spine stiffening. “As a matter of fact, yes. I don’t know what your problem is with me, but you can’t deny that this evening has been a success.”

Baghra laughed, but there was no humor in her tone. She stopped rummaging around the desk and leaned forward on her cane towards Alina, enunciating every word. “A success for _whom_?”

The clench of Alina’s stomach deepened, but she pushed past it, choosing to ignore the growing dread. “For me! For Aleks! _For both of us!_ What are you even going on about?”

Maybe Baghra was crazy, senile even. Or maybe she was just an overprotective mother with ridiculous standards for her son. She had never really liked Alina. _So maybe this is just her way of running me off,_ Alina thought to herself, rather desperately.

The older woman plucked a bundle of slightly wrinkled papers from the desk, turned a few of its pages then started to read aloud. “‘ _Due to the collaborative nature of the work, Artist Two agrees that Artist One may act as sole representative of their work and will have final negotiation with The Gallery on terms of commission, pricing, copyright, exclusivity, and promotion of work._ ’ Guess which one of you is both Artist One and The Gallery? Or better yet-” Baghra flipped through a few more pages. “ _‘The Gallery also reserves the right to hold Artist Two’s independent original works as long as they deem necessary for promotional purposes.’_ Followed by…” She flipped another page. “ _The Gallery may also sell Artist One’s independent original and reprinted work at their own discretion to both private and public parties.”_ Baghra looked up from the pages grimly. “You signed away all of your rights to your art, girl. And you did it with a dopey grin and hearts in your eyes.”

It was as if somebody opened a window to the snowy cityscape of Os Alta, Alina felt her entire body go cold. She reached for the contract, her mind still clinging to some hope that Baghra was wrong. But as her eyes roamed over the pages she could start to see the pattern of sentences and words Aleks had used to bind her to him.

_Artist One._

_The Gallery._

_Artist Two._

How had she missed it? It was only her second time reading the words and it was so obvious that it was painful. Was a second glance all it took? Would she have figured it out on her own eventually? Or would she have always needed somebody to spell it out for her?

Alina felt numb, her surroundings were dulled to her, drowned out by the noise that was her heartbeat whooshing by her ears.

“Why?”

She asked the question to the space around her, to nobody in particular, but Baghra answered her anyways.

“Because he is greedy. He is my son, brilliant, talented, and sometimes kind. But he is also arrogant, harsh, and always cunning. He saw an opportunity and he took it.”

 _He saw an opportunity and took it._ She repeated the sentence in her mind. _I’m the ‘opportunity’ and he took… me._

Alina wondered if Baghra knew the double meaning to her words. Probably not though. Why would she? Nobody, not even Aleks had assumed her to be a virgin at twenty-three.

Ex-virgin.

She shook the thought loose from her head. That wasn’t really what mattered right now. What really mattered were the 10 paintings and the Zemeni Sun Woman she had made for the collaboration that Aleks was “sole representative” of with “final negation” on. That and the 14 other Sun Women that were also on display in the gallery. He had insisted that it would be the perfect time to showcase them, a great and relatively easy boost to her career seeing as they were already completed. Now Alina knew that he had just wanted them on gallery property so the he could hold them indefinitely if he wanted to. And she guessed that he did.

It felt like ground was dropping out from underneath her.

_You signed away all of your rights to your art, girl. And you did it with a dopey grin and hearts in your eyes._

And it was all her fault. Alina squeezed her eyes shut as if she could block it all out or wake up from a nightmare by falling asleep.

Why had she trusted him? Why had she thought that he would actually love her? What was she going to do now that he had taken so much from her?

“I _am_ and idiot.” She accosted herself under her breath.

Alina felt an icy hand rest on her forearm and her eyes snapped open. Baghra stood next to her looking very displeased and slightly repulsed, like she couldn’t believe she actually was touching another human being.

Alina shared the same disbelief and now had a new understanding as to why the woman lived in oven-like temperatures while also wearing giant sack-like sweaters. Her hand was freezing. Did the woman have a thyroid condition or something?

Baghra made a harrumph noise in the back of her throat. “Yes, you are an idiot-”

Alina jerked her arm away in frustration.

“ _But,_ ” Baghra continued forcefully, “you are also a very talented artist. I see it and so did everyone who came to the opening tonight. My son has excellent taste. He wouldn’t feature you otherwi-”

“You mean _steal_ ,” Alina interrupted. “He wouldn’t _steal_ my art otherwise. What consolation is that, Baghra? Do you even hear what you are saying right now?” She shook her head in disbelief. “You know what? You and your son, _Aleks_.” Alina let his name drip with the full force of her emotions, disgust and anger rolled together tightly around a ball of hurt and dipped in a sugar coating of disbelief.

“You two can go to hell.”

She stormed out of the office, through the storage room and out the backdoor without a glance over her shoulder. She was pretty certain that she was two seconds away from simultaneously exploding and dissolving into tears and she didn’t want anyone to see that.

“Alina?” She heard her name being called distantly from behind her.

Panic gripped her.

Sudden and irrational panic.

She started to run.

~ ~ ~ ~

Alina contemplated her options. She had run a shockingly far distance considering her fitness (or lack thereof), the snowy conditions, and the impractical heels that Genya always managed to convince her to wear. She might have run farther if it hadn’t been for an ice-slicked man hole cover. The moment the the thin soles of her shoes made contact with it she was sent flying, landing face first in a snow drift. And not the pretty snowdrifts that graced the fields of Ravka’s country sides. No, she landed in the dirty plow sludge piled onto the sidewalk.

She rolled onto her back, ignoring the sting of her exposed skin on the grimy snow and for a second she contemplated giving up then and there. But that would be melodramatic and _Saints was it freezing_.

Alina picked herself off the ground and took in her surroundings. She had somehow found her way to Fjerdan district of Os Alta and, judging from the poisonous stares she was getting from the bundled passersby, her scantily clad presence wasn’t very welcome here.

 _You could offer to help me instead of just glaring._ She thought to herself, but at the same time she wondered if she would help the crazy lady in the snowbank. She heaved a shivering sigh, realizing that she was definitely going to need some kind of help. Everything but the crumpled contract in her hand and her phone had been left behind at the gallery, forgotten in the little purse she had stored in Aleks’ office.

 _No. Not Aleks, not anymore._ That was the name that he wanted her to call him. The name that he had given her in the throes of passion after he was sure he had her affection and she was bound by his contract. So she was back to Aleksander. Or better yet, just Morozova.

Alina pressed the home button on her phone revealing a small slew of texts, all from Genya. She tried not to notice the disappointment she felt when she realized there were no texts from him. No “I’m sorry” or “Forgive me.” Not even an “Are you okay” or “Where are you?”

Genya  
>> IT WORKED!! I just did it! Leaned in and kissed the bastard! XD  
>> The kulich is NOT A LIE!  
>> REPEAT, THE KULICH IS NOT A LIE!

Alina felt a little smile on her face that didn’t quite reach her eyes. She was happy for Genya, she really was, but she couldn’t deny the sticky feeling of envy that crawled up her back. That and the drop of her stomach as she realized that her backup plan was shot. She couldn’t ask Genya to drive halfway across Os Alta in the snow at twelve in the morning, especially not when she was finally making progress with David.

So what was her plan then? Alexei didn’t drive so there was no way he could pick her up. And Mal? Alina stomach twisted at the thought. She didn’t want to risk calling him and have him not pick up again. It would just be too much on a night like tonight.

She wracked her brain, turned in a slow circle, and let out a frustrated huff.

Alina knew who to call. She knew exactly who, but she was loathe to do so. She gritted her teeth and her frozen fingers fumbled at the screen of her phone as she tried to open her contacts list. She had no other choice. She pressed the little phone icon.

Nikolai answered on the first ring. “Alina? I’m so glad you ca-“

She cut him off. “Don’t say anything, _Lantsov_. I need a favor from you, no questions asked.”

There was silence on the other end of the line. _Good_ , Alina thought, _that means he’s listening for once._

“I need you to pick me up. I’m in the Fjerdan district, near that one statue of a wolf.”

“What’s going on, Alina? Are you o-”

Alina hung up the phone.

It didn’t take Nikolai very long to show up, only ten minutes. He must have been pretty close by to begin with, but Alina still felt frozen through. She had expected him to drive up on his motorcycle, instead he showed up in a bright blue Hummer with giant snow tires. It was practically a small tank. And despite the near blinding flash of his ridiculously high up headlights, it didn’t escape Alina’s notice that this vehicle had a vanity license plate as well.

‘HUMNBRD’

If her eyes weren’t puffy with tears and the bite of the cold air she might have rolled them. ‘ _Human Bread?’ What a stupid name._

She pulled open the door and stiffly hauled herself into the passenger seat. It was heated.

Alina thought that she might die of bliss then and there.

Nikolai let out a low appreciative whistle. “I’ve never seen a hotter ice cube.”

Alina’s eyes, which had fluttered shut in contentment, snapped open to glare at him. She expected to find his usual cocky smile, and was ready to tell him off for it, but the expression she found was tense with concern.

“Are you okay?” He asked her, his voice shifted from casual humor to worried tension. “What happened?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” She bit out caustically and grabbed for her seatbelt.

“Yes, actually.” He replied softly and calmly, the way one talks when trying very hard not to spook a wild horse.

Alina looked away from him and out the window at the snowbank that she had fallen into.

“Just drive, Lantsov.” Her voice was little more than a whisper, but he shifted the gears and started to drive.

She didn’t know where he was going. She didn’t bother to ask and she wasn’t sure if she even wanted to know. The road stretched out in front of them like the silence between them.

Nikolai reached over to adjust the heat, turning it on full blast. Alina noticed that his hand hesitated over the volume knob for a moment before it returned to the steering wheel. She wondered what he had been listening to before he had picked her up. Absentmindedly she opened her mouth to ask him, but immediately snapped it shut when she remembered that she was still mad at him.

They continued on in silence. Nikolai didn’t ask any more questions and she didn’t offer any words. At least not for a long time. It must have been at least twenty minutes of quiet until she finally gave in.

“Did you know?” She asked. Alina kept her face forward as she watched the steady pattern of broken white lines that divided the lanes. In the speeding dark the world narrowed to focus on the road leaving everything else a blur.

Aleksander had once told her that when there isn’t enough light the human eye is no longer able to make out colors, it sees in greyscale. “ _But we don’t tend to notice the loss of color distinction. The human brain makes out a tree and knows it to be green and brown. We fill in the blanks and see what we want to in the darkness_.” She remembered thinking how smart he was, how brilliant. She remembered thinking how lucky she to have him.

But now she saw the bushes blurring past and knew that she couldn’t trust her eyes to tell her their true color.

“Did I know what, Alina?” Nikolai’s voice still had that soft, hesitant quality to it, like she might fling herself out the car door if he wasn’t careful.

It was really pissing her off.

“That night outside of Dagrenner. Did you know who I was trying to get away from? Or was it all just a happy coincidence that you just so happened to be there to console me in my time of need?” Her voice became progressively caustic as she spoke. “Was it all just some trick to get me to open up to you? Is that what you do? You have your brother humiliate women so that you can swoop in to pick up the pieces? Why would you do that? Was it all just some big joke for you? A game? I _trusted you_! And you- you-”

She was yelling. Alina cut herself off at the realization, her breath heaving in her chest. But, she wasn’t yelling at the man beside her, not really, not anymore.

Nikolai just looked at her, slightly pale, but with a determined set to his mouth. “I’m not going to try and defend myself to you, Alina. Because I messed up, I know I did, but not in the way you think I did and not on purpose.”

He paused for a moment to run an anxious hand through his hair and Alina suddenly realized that they had stopped moving. They weren’t even on the road anymore; Nikolai had parked in a random parking lot and she hadn’t even noticed.

“But I have absolutely no idea what you mean about my brother and I was just as shocked to run into outside of Dagrenner. Ecstatic, but shocked none the less.”

He could be lying, just like he lied about who he was. Why would she trust his word now? Alina hesitated. “You really didn’t know I was out with Vasily?”

He made a face, “No, and I honestly wish I still didn’t. Vasily? Really?” His hand went to his stomach like he might be sick, but then a wicked grin flashed across his face. “Was he any good?”

Alina groaned. “Gross! Nikolai!”

He chuckled, “I’ll take that as a no.”

Horrified, she tried to back track, “I didn’t- we didn’t- I would never!”

And then Nikolai was bent over laughing.

 _Oh. He was joking. The bastard was teasing me._ She wanted to burst into tears. She wanted to strangle him.

Instead a stray giggle escaped her mouth and then she was laughing as well. The whole car shook with the stuff and they didn’t quiet for a few minutes. Once they finally did settle down the calm was promptly broken by Nikolai gravely saying, “Your couple name would have been Vasilina.”

It took them even longer to recover from that. Alina eventually sobered though, about at the point when their laughs became sporadic hiccups between breathlessness.

“I still haven’t forgiven you.” She said, but the words were without malice, more a sad statement than an accusation.

He sobered as well. “I know.”

The silence stretched between them until Nikolai went to turn on the car. “I guess I should take you home now.”

Alina stared at her hands, a cellphone clutched in one and the contract in the other. She didn’t feel ready to go home. She felt…

Empty.

Emotionally and physically drained.

As if reading her mind Nikolai said, “We could go somewhere else. Maybe get you some food?”

Alina felt a sudden rush of relief that she didn’t have to go home, not just yet.

She nodded. “Yeah, okay. Why don’t you get me some tacos? Rich Boy.”

Nikolai started the car then fiddled with the stereo. A thumping beat filled the car and he took off for the closest taco truck.

“What the hell is this?” Alina asked him as a distinctly nautical melody interlaced with the frantic tempo and screeching guitar.

“Pirate Death Metal.”

Nikolai said it like it was the most normal thing to say in the world. Alina’s eyes went wide and she shook her head slowly back and forth. “You are absolutely insane.”

“Flattery will get you everywhere, my dear.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everybody's favorite prince/cinnamon bun is back! :D Alina still hasn't completely forgiven him, but we're on the road to healing.
> 
> Aleksander though? Ohhhhhhhh noooooo. He really stepped in it this time.
> 
> Just so you know, Pirate Death Metal is an actual musical genre. I discovered this on a taxi ride home after a verrrry long night on the town. It was not a pleasant discovery. Also the thing about seeing in greyscale when it's dark? Totally true! It has do to with the decreased sensitivity of our optic nerves when there are less photons! :3
> 
> Comments and kudos feed my soul, make me type faster, and... I don't know, make me feel good? So like yeah. Much obliged! :P


	21. For the Second Time

The tacos that Alina and Nikolai got were truly horrendous, mysteriously dripping with grease interspersed with oddly dry patches of gritty spices or burnt meat. The two of them demolished it all in minutes. It was like the brownie debacle all over again, although this time only Alina had been drinking on an empty stomach. Which made Nikolai’s speedy consumption of the nasty things even more impressive.

Really, the two of them had been lucky that the truck was even open at one in the morning on the night of Os Alta’s first heavy snow. They forwent the traditional folded chairs and tables in front of the truck, and instead huddled in the Hummer as they ate their food. Between hasty bites Nikolai had informed Alina was named ‘Hummingbird’ and not ‘Human Bread’ as she had originally assumed. She kind of preferred the original name.

“It’s a pun, Alina! Hummer? Hummingbird _Hummin-bird?_ I’m a genius!”

“Well, you are something.” She replied sourly, effectively ending that subject.

Their conversation felt like it was being driven by a nervous teenager driving for the first time. They started topics hesitantly, surprised themselves with the speed or ease of their company, and then would quickly come to a jerking halt with the slightest misstep.

Alina hated it. Hated the way she simultaneously felt betrayed and at ease with Nikolai. She found herself wanting to tell him everything he had missed in the past few weeks; funny moments with Alexei at the Brew, a few tales of cooking mishaps, a new television series that she thought he would enjoy, or the exciting progression of Genya and David’s relationship. But at the same time she felt a vindictive need to stay quiet, wrestling both of them into a tense silence.

It was like Nikolai didn’t deserve the little anecdotes and pieces of Alina’s life, not after what he did. But she found herself _wanting_ him to deserve them again. She wanted to forgive him, and as their stilting conversation stretched on she knew that at some point she would. It wasn’t going to be tonight and it may not be for a while longer, but eventually she knew that he would earn back the piece of her heart that she had already carved out for him.

She wondered if she could ever have the same potential to forgive Morozova.

But in the quiet moments stretched thin and tenuous between her and Nikolai, a hard and definitive answered formed in her heart.

No.

Maybe Nikolai. Probably Nikolai.

But never Aleks.

~ ~ ~ ~

When Nikolai finally dropped Alina off in front of her house she found herself feeling marginally better. It was either Nikolai’s company combined with food in her stomach or the onset of emotional shock. Alina was leaning towards the latter.

But any comfort she had gleaned in the last hour immediately dissipated when she saw that the living room light was on. She would have thought that Mal would either still be at work or asleep. A part of her wanted to turn around and beg Nikolai to drive her anywhere else, but she squashed down the irrational impulse. It was two in the morning, she was tired, and this was still her home too.

Besides, Mal _had_ been a little bit better lately. He actually seemed to trying to be at least a decent person towards her. It was stiff and awkward and Alina wasn’t completely sure that she favored it over the explosive yelling matches between them, but it was progress nonetheless.

Still, Alina couldn’t help the tingle of dread that spread from the base of her stomach as she worked to unlock the old door. She intentionally went slowly, each turn of the locks purposeful and precise in a way that really wasn’t necessary.

_Maybe he just left the light on before he left for work. Maybe he accidently fell asleep with it on and I can sneak by him. Maybe…_

He was directly on the other side of the door.

Alina blinked up at him in surprise and he blinked back with equal shock. “Alina? What are you doing home? I would have thought…”

He trailed off awkwardly and the unspoken end to his sentence rang louder in their ears than if the words had actually left his mouth. ‘ _I would have thought that you would be with him.’_

_I would have thought so too_ , she thought to herself but didn’t voice.

Alina hovered in the doorway, the entrance unintentionally blocked by Mal. And suddenly all resolve that she had that this was her home too left her. She hesitated and, though she hated herself for it, her voice was timid and small as she asked him, “Can I come in?”

An odd look passed over Mal’s face and then he hopped into action. “Of course! Saints though, you must be cold. Get in here!” He shifted out of the way allowing Alina to enter the house and then he closed the door behind her.

She made to go straight to her room, but Mal stopped her. “Are you okay?”

Alina laughed and it was a harsh, bitter sound that cut through the room raggedly. “Of course I’m okay Mal. I’m coming home at two in the morning, wearing this- thisnapkin- in the middle of a snowstorm, because I’m _okay_.”

She had made her tone cold and sarcastic, purposefully trying to provoke him, goad him into a fight. But the concerned expression on his face didn’t change. “What happened?” He insisted.

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Did he hurt you?”

She laughed again, intending it to be just as biting as the one before it. The effect was ruined though, softened by the tightness of her throat as tears pooled in her eyes. Alina turned away not wanting Mal to see the emotions on her face as clear and dark as words printed on a page.

“Alina?” Her name was soft, almost hesitant on his lips. “You don’t have to say anything if you don’t want to, but I’m right here, ready to listen.”

A gentle hand cupped her face, but instead of using it to turn her face back to him, Mal just held it there. There was no demand in the touch, only comfort, and Alina felt something small in her snap, almost imperceptible, but sending a hurricane force through her nonetheless. She started to sob.

It was messy and jagged crying. The type that caused her chest to heave painfully and watery snot to flow down her crumpled face. Ugly crying.

Mal just folded her into his arms, not seeming to care that the front of his shirt had a rapidly growing damp spot as she sobbed against him. He let her cry herself out while calmly stroking her hair and murmuring comforting sounds into her ear. His voice remained even and steady, so it wasn’t until her own sobbing petered out that she realized that he was shaking as well.

The words he whispered to her were almost a mantra. “I’m so sorry, Alina. I’m so so sorry. I’m going to kill him. I promise. I’m sorry. I love you. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” He rocked her in his arms to the rhythm of his words. “I let you down. I’m sorry. I love you. I’m going to murder him. I swear.”

With a pang Alina realized what Mal must have thought happened, that Morozova must have forced himself upon her. Of course he would assume the worst, Alina knew that she would in his position. If Genya had fallen into her arms with wordless sobs, Alina would be out for David’s blood in an instant, no questions asked. But Morozova hadn’t harmed her physically. In fact, he hadn’t done a single thing without her explicit consent.

_“You signed away all of your rights… And you did it with a dopey grin and hearts in your eyes.”_

Morozova might have twisted around her feelings, made her think that he cared more about her than he did, but in the end the fault lay in her hands. And though it would be so easy to let Mal paint over the mistakes that Alina had made so that Morozova became the portrait of a villain, she found that she couldn’t.

Alina tilted her face up to look at Mal and was surprised to see that he had been crying as well. There were tear tracks on his face and his eyes were rimmed with red. She lifted a hand to his cheek to wipe at the lines of moisture. “Oh. No, Mal. He didn’t hurt me, not like that.”

“But you… but he… You looked so happy tonight though, what else could have happened?”

She took a deep shuddering breath, stealing herself for what she was about to admit, then looked him in the eye. “He wrote up a contract that gives him final say on basically everything to the point where my art is essentially his… and I signed it.”

“Oh Alina.” He sighed pityingly, “Didn’t you read it first?”

“Of course I read it! It was just- He- I just-” She dissolved into another round of tears that had Mal looking positively panicked. He brought her to back his chest and made shushing apologies until she collected herself again.

“Mal?”

“Yeah?”

“What did you mean that I looked so happy _tonight_?”

He looked sheepish. “Oh, um. I went to the gallery.”

“You did? But I didn’t see you! I thought you had work.”

His eyes roamed the room as if looking for an escape route. He bit the inside of one his cheeks.

“Mal?” Alina’s eyes narrowed at him and it was like they were ten years old again and Mal was pretending that he hadn’t been the one to eat the last cookie. Although even if she didn’t know him as well or for as long as she did, the way his protective grip on her loosened or the shift of his weight from one foot to another would have given him away.

“Maaal?” She stretched out the single syllable of his name. Under any other circumstances her tone would have been light, playful even. Instead it was sharp and cold, hardened by the night’s events.

He worried a hand through his hair. “I didn’t have work tonight… I never did.”

Hurt lanced its way through her chest. Just another man in her life who lied to her.

“Then why…”

“I couldn’t stand it, okay? I wanted to be there, to support you and your art. But I knew I just… couldn’t. So I lied, told you that I had work so it would be okay for me not to be there. Instead of going, I just sat here and watched all three Annie movies like a complete loser until I couldn’t stand it anymore.”

Alina had drawn herself away from him, not knowing exactly where he was going with his story, yet becoming filled with dread.

“I went to the gallery and I instantly knew I was right. He was all over you and you were _loving it_.” She flinched at the edge in his tone, yet he continued on, not seeming to notice. “But I was still going to go in, I was still going to stay. I should have, I should have shown my support and told you just how proud I am of you being featured in a gallery like a decent friend. Even if it is _his_ gallery. But then you leaned up and kissed him and-” His voice fractured over a ragged breath and he turned away from her.

“If I had tried to be there for you, I wouldn’t have been able to hold it together, not when all I wanted to do was punch him. I didn’t want to ruin your night or hurt you. Not again. I- I’ve been messing up, Alina. I know that and I’m trying, but…”

He trailed off and she stood there awkwardly, still not really understanding what he was saying or what he wanted from her. Somehow the tables had turned and she now felt like she should be comforting him. But for what?

Suddenly she had to know. They had been dancing around it for too long. Whatever _it_ was. Alina wasn’t sure. Or maybe she hadn’t wanted to be sure. It had been months of Mal acting strange and lashing out at her, ever since she brought Nikolai home. And she wasn’t a complete idiot.

“Do you love me?” She asked him.

His response was instantaneous, a kneejerk reaction. “Of course I love you!”

Alina paused, hesitating on the edge of something that had haunted her for so long. But what was one more heartbreak? She had been picking at the glue of them for too long and she couldn’t stand it anymore. She ripped off the bandaid.

“No. Are you in love with me?”

They both stilled, neither of them even daring to breath. His back was turned to her and she couldn’t see his face or the impact her question had on his expression.

“I’m sorry.” He whispered.

Alina leaned against a wall, suddenly feeling light headed but no longer heavy hearted. She had been carrying her weighty load of unrequited love and tangled emotions for too long. Finally, she was set free, even if it hadn’t been the response she had longed for all these years. At least she finally knew.

“I don’t just love you, Alina. I’m in love with you and I’m so sorry. You’re my family, _essentially my sister_ and I… I’m sorry.” Mal turned around, his face pure shame.

The weight returned to her, even heavier this time. Her legs gave out and she slid down the wall. She could feel the cool texture of it scrape across her exposed back and catch on the straps of her dress a little as she descended.

“Alina?” Mal knelt down beside her and took her face between his hands. “I understand if you hate me for it. And if you don’t feel the same I’ll leave you alone, I promise. I just need to know. Do you- could you- ever feel the same about me?”

His face was a mirror, reflecting back all of the sprawling guilt she had ever felt over him.

He understood. He was there, right there, _finally_. And she was…

Broken.

Alina had no idea that she could produce so many tears in one night. She thought that she could have flooded the house with them. And yet more came.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I know that you must still be reeling from what _he_ did to you and I should have told you sooner. But I promise you, I didn’t know.” He closed his eyes for a moment and huffed a bitter laugh. “I’m such an idiot. I didn’t know until I was losing you.”

He picked up her hand, the one she had cut so many nights ago. It was fully healed now, a thin line of raised, red tissue. Mal traced his finger along it and Morozova’s faced filled her memory. Alina jerked her hand away.

Mal looked like a man who had just received a death sentence. He was moving away from her again and if Alina didn’t act now she was sure she would lose him. He was right, she was still aching over what Morozova did to her, but she knew that losing him would hurt so much more.

She was desperate and afraid. She was confused and hurt. She was tired. For the second time that night she confessed her love. “No, wait Mal! I love you, I am in love with you and I have been for so long.”

It was the truth, so why did it sound so hollow to her ears?

A tentative smile of success touched his lips even as his brow furrowed in confusion.

“But you… with him.”

“You said it yourself. You _never_ saw me until now. What was I supposed to do, wait forever? I may have…” Alina paused for a moment not wanting to admit quite so much. “But it’s not too late. I might have and he might have, but it was always just you.” She promised him even as the words settled uneasily in her mind.

Wanting something to be the truth doesn’t erase a lie.

Alina leaned in, and for the very first time Mal met her in the middle. Their lips just barely touched, only exchanging tentative whispers, and it was as soft and sweet as Alina always thought it would be. For some reason it cut a hole through her heart, but instead of stopping there and calling it a night, she leaned in further.

Where they should have pulled apart, they clung to each other. When they should have gone to sleep and waited until morning for clear heads, they continued to cloud their minds with want. Alina fell into his embrace, trying desperately to fill the holes of her heart with him. It was so easy. She didn’t have to think or feel, she just had to fall and let Mal catch her.

~ ~ ~ ~

When Alina woke up in the morning she felt oddly displaced. She could tell it had to be late in the morning, but the light behind her eyelids was too dim even for an overcast day. Her body felt unusually heavy, compressed even, and the bed felt too warm. The room smelled slightly different, comforting and familiar, but different nonetheless.

Her eyelids fluttered open.

_Oh._

She was in Mal’s room. The series of last night’s events played through her mind like an oddly mixed genre movie reel. Romance, Drama, Horror, Comedy… Tragedy. She steeled herself for the wave emotions that had to be coming, the tears, the hitched breathing, but there was just nothing. She felt empty, numb, and there was only one thought in her head.

_So, is this where I’m going to wake up from here on out? What about my room?_

Was this what her life was now? Was she _with_ Mal now? His confessions and her admissions the night before suggested it and what they had done between the sheets of his bed seemed to confirm it, but even with the pressure of Mal’s arm slung over her and the heat of him along her back, Alina wasn’t certain.

She was sore all over. Her legs and arms from running, her back and neck from stress, and the space between her legs from…

It was too warm, she couldn’t breathe.

As carefully as she could, Alina disentangled herself from Mal’s arms and slid out of the bed. She just needed some time to herself, some space to think. She silently exited the bedroom and made her way to the kitchen.

Coffee. She needed coffee.

This was what she had wanted all along wasn’t it? So what if the path leading there had taken a detour? Just because she had… relations with two men in one night… Well technically there had been a midnight at one point, so two days would be more accurate. _Oh who am I kidding?_

She tried to push everything else out of her mind and just focus on the process of brewing a pot of very strong coffee. She winced when she caught her bleary-eyed reflection in the side of the carafe. _Oh well, it’s nothing that a good long shower won’t fix_. And besides, her appearance was the least of concerns at the moment.

She was happy though, she had Mal and he was all that she needed. And if she still hurt from last night? It was understandable. The bastard _had_ stolen her art after all. That would be upsetting to anyone.

The coffee maker grumbled to life just as there was a knock at the front door. Alina sighed and did a quick double check of her attire. She wasn’t wearing any pants, but she had on one of Mal’s shirts which reached almost to her knobby knees. It wasn’t the most put together she had ever been, but it was enough for the mail person she assumed was at the door.

But it wasn’t a mail person at the door.

Of course it wasn’t. Alina could never be so lucky.

When the old door creaked open her eyes immediately looked at the ground first, expecting to see the mail or a package. Instead she found a pair of shiny, black oxford shoes. Her eyes moved upwards to a pair of black suit pants, then its corresponding jacket, a silk black tie, and above it all a terribly familiar, unsettlingly handsome face.

Aleksander Morozova. And he was also taking in her attire.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, I know. Trust me _I know_ how bleak this all is right now (like ew Mal?), but I will just remind you that this isn't the last chapter... although I guess that is coming up. :)
> 
> Well, I hope you liked this chapter anyways! Also I recently wrote a one shot about David (and Genya), so if you haven't read it already I highly recommend it! (Dat shameless self-promo tho!) Especially if you are needing something to read between updates of this. You can find the fic in question [here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/13232682).
> 
> Anyways I hope you are all having a nice day. Kudos and comments make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. Which I expect I will need to get me through these dark Malina times.


	22. The Sun Won't Come Out Tomorrow

Alina’s stomach dropped out of her at the sight of him. Why would he come back? Hadn’t he gotten everything he wanted from her? What more was left to take?

At the same time her heart gave a painful little flutter, like the wings of an injured bird. Maybe it had all been a mistake. Maybe it wasn’t too late.

Without saying anything, Morozova pulled out a hand that he had been holding behind his back and offered something to Alina. It was about two dozen of the biggest roses that she had ever seen. They were gorgeous, thick with petals, and so red that they were practically black.

Her first reaction was to give a little gasp of admiration. She had never gotten a whole bouquet before. A few flowers here and there, yes. But these… these were well… _stunning_.

_Do I even have vase large enough for them though? There was that blue one I thrifted. Shit, it leaks though. Maybe… Wait a second. WAIT JUST A FUCKING SECOND._ Alina thought to herself. The brief moment of glee at being presented with such a lovely offering was snuffed out once she remembered the person who was giving them and the reason why he was giving them.

She snatched them from his hands with a snarl. “Are you _fucking kidding me_?!”

Alina grabbed the head of one of the stupidly perfect roses and crushed it between her fingers. The petals were softy and squishy, so pigmented that as she destroyed them, they stained her hands a rusty red color. She tore at it, squashing and throwing petals to the ground.

“Are you _serious_ with this shit?!”

There were too many roses to shred though and with every petal bruised in her fingers, an achingly sweet scent filled her nose. _They even_ smell _amazing?_ She thought angrily and threw the bundle on the ground to get away from their annoying perfection. With a bare foot she continued to grind the flowers into the rough wood of the porch.

“What? Did you expect that you could just show up with these pathetic flowers and I would just swoon and forgive you? Fuck you. Fuck you, fuck you, _fuck you!_ ” She punctuated each curse with a stomp of her foot.

Morozova didn’t say anything, he just continued to watch her with infuriatingly calm eyes, and after a few more emphatic _fuck you’s_ , Alina finally gave up smashing the flowers to a pulp. She sagged against the doorframe stared at the mess of flowers on the ground.

“Why the flowers? I know you aren’t that stupid.”

He nudged one of the more fortunate roses with one of his toes.

“Better them than me.” He said with a faint smirk.

Alina gaped at him. After everything he had done, he was making jokes? Did he think that this was _funny_?  She was going to murder him. She was going to strangle him with her petal stained hands. Wrap each individual finger around his strong neck and squeeze until his stupidly pretty face turned blue.

Her fingers itched, but… No. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

“You- you…” Alina stuttered then trailed off.

_You broke my heart._ She had been about to say, before she cut herself off. Why give him that power too?

“You stole my art.”

Her eyes burned, but were still tear-free for the moment. She fought the urge to rub them. Alina could do this. She could make it through this conversation if she just focused on her anger over her art and not... the other stuff. With a firm hand she shoved aside the hurt and confusion. She ignored the deeper betrayal of the taste of his lips after he said that he loved her.

_I love you, I love you not, I love you… I love you not._ Her eyes sought out any petals that still resembled their original form. How many times had she plucked apart a daisy to play that little game?

He interrupted her thoughts with a soft almost pleading voice. “I told you to read it. I wanted you to. I did. You should have read it. You said that you did, but you signed it anyways.”

Alina looked up and studied his face. To her surprise his eyes were closed and there was a familiar furrow between his brows. It was the same face. The same exact face he had made when he said that he loved her.

It was the face he made when he lied.

She suddenly wished that she hadn’t smashed the bouquet on the ground, because her hands ached to hit him with it. Instead she balled them at her hips.

“I don’t believe you. If you wanted me to read it, actually read it, then you would have given it to me sooner. Don’t lie to me.”

“I’ve never lied to you.” He turned his eyes on her, fierce and assertive.

“Yes you have! When you said that you-” _loved me,_ “wanted me to read it.” She changed the course of her sentence abruptly. “Why give it to me if you didn’t want me to sign it. Why even write it? What, was it some kind of sick test? And I failed, so now you get my art?”

“It’s still your art.”

Alina gave a harsh laugh. “Yeah, you just get to decide what happens to it, where it goes, who sees it, how much money it makes _you_. No big deal!” She ground a heel into the pulpy remains of the flowers. “Silly me for overacting!”

“You still have a say-”

“Oh! A say? Lucky me! I get to give you my _opinion_ on my own art. I’m ever so _grateful_. Fuck off.”

“It doesn’t have to be that way. We’ll talk, find a balance.”

She looked at him incredulously. “What balance? You have all the power.”

Realization struck her like a lightning bolt.

Power.

All this time it had always been about power. The way he tried to hold doors open for her, buy her meals or cellphones. She had said it herself. He was older than her, richer than her, more in control. There wasn’t balance there. And now she wondered why she had ever thought there had been.

“I don’t have to.” He insisted with that same furrow in his brow. “It’s was a collaboration, Alina. It still is. You just have to-”

“No.”

“If you would just-”

He had bled her dry and yet he still wanted more.

“No!” She had no room to back up so she pushed him away. He stumbled a bit, obviously surprised at the strength of her push, but quickly regained his footing.

“Alina?” A groggy voice sounded from behind her. “Why are you yelling?”

Her spine stiffened as she froze in place, hands still hovering from her shove. She knew that she didn’t want Mal to come out here. But she didn’t know which she feared more, Mal seeing Morozova on their doorstep or Morozova seeing Mal at her side.

“It’s nothing!” She called over her shoulder with forced cheer. “Just some ding-dong-ditchers!”

“Oh, okay. Come back to bed then!”

All of the blood drained out of Alina. If Morozova hadn’t figured it out by her oversized tee-shirt, he knew now.

Words that she had been fighting ever since she woke up came flooding into her head- _whore, slut, tramp, floozy, ho_ \- and her stomach became a writhing pit of guilt. She wanted to seek comfort in Mal’s arms and forgiveness in Morozova’s. She wanted to run away and hide from both of them. Mal’s shirt felt like a burning brand on her skin and she fought the urge to tear it off. Instead she continued to stand there, hands balled into fists.

With the same forced casualness, she called out, “Just a minute!”

Then she stood tense and waiting for Morozova’s judgement. She waited and waited, thinking of everything she could say to refute him. He had hurt her first, he hadn’t even tried to run after her, he stole her art…

But the judgement never came. She hadn’t been able to look at him, but the excruciating silence finally drove her to glace up at his face. It was stone, completely blank, a controlled mask devoid of any emotions. She couldn’t even tell if he had heard Mal, but he had to have.

She had expected thunder and lighting. Not an abyss.

Alina wanted to scream, _don’t you care?_ He hurt her so much, but even with this she couldn’t hurt him.

He turned around and walked away without another word.

‘ _I don’t share_ ,’ his words rang in her head. Alina had wondered what more he wanted. And now she wondered why she wanted him to continue wanting her.

Numbly she went back to bed, snuggled into Mal’s welcoming arms, and tried to ignore the way she felt too hot there.

His room was too dark. She tried to ignore that too.

There was a heavy weight settling over her heart.

She let it.

~ ~ ~ ~

Later that day she charged her phone which had died at some point after she had called Nikolai for help. She found a slew of texts from Morozova, but didn’t read a single one. Instead she blocked his number and deleted his contact information from her phone. She pocketed it and went to go sit on the couch with Mal. Her body fit perfectly into his, like two pieces of a puzzle.

Her phone buzzed and she scrambled to look at it. The text wasn’t from Morozova though. Of course it wasn’t. It was a random text from Alexei that could wait. She set her phone face down on the coffee table instead of putting it back in her pocket.

“Are you okay?” Mal asked her.

“Yeah, just tired from… everything.”

He nuzzled his face into her hair. “I love you.”

The weight grew heavier.

“I love you too.”

~ ~ ~ ~

After a few weeks Alina started to feel better about the whole thing. She learned how to fall asleep and wake up in Mal’s bed. She let Genya and Alexei know that she was dating Mal now, but wouldn’t give them very many details. She continued working like nothing had happened, except for the few moments where she would duck behind the espresso machine or into the break room when she thought she saw a familiar head of black hair. She tried her best to ignore the nagging voice at the back of her head and the heaviness of her heart.

But for all that she had built herself back up and let herself heal, she was not ready for what Morozova still had in store for her.

One day Alina woke up and found her art plastered across the entire city. The billboards along her path to work were especially full. It was an old sketch, a doodle really, one that she didn’t even know he had.

Simple thin black lines, faded colors from old markers, a blonde woman with a large scarf holding a steaming cup of coffee to her lips… with a glowing halo of light behind her.

One of her Sun Women.

The sign read, “Drüskelle coffee – Wake up with the sun.”

It was even trademarked.

The first thing Alina did when she got home was to take down all of her art from the walls to shove it under a bed that she no longer used. The only thing that remained was the painting she made for Mal because that was his. But when he got home and found all of her art gone, he took that down too.

~ ~ ~ ~

Alina used to spend most of her spare time painting or sketching. She used to have perpetually stained hands from poor quality art supplies, little papercuts from flipping through her sketchbook, and pencils tucked behind her ears. She would go do bed early and doodle her way through work.

Now she only wrote down names and orders on the paper cups and usually went out with Mal and his friends. Mikhael and Dubrov had mellowed out since she started dating Mal, but she wouldn’t say that they were her favorite people to hang out with. They mostly bar hopped and roamed Os Alta in the night. The evenings were raucous and dramatic and Alina kind of hated it. But it seemed to be the only way she could spend time with Mal, so she suffered it.

The worst part was all of the women who looked down their noses at her. They didn’t understand how such a scrawny little mouse could have taken Malyen Oretsev off the market. Alina was used to girls pretending to be her friend to get to Mal. She was not used to them openly hating her for standing in their way.

_“Ugh, she’s not even drinking.”_

_“What a bore.”_

_“So pale and grey. Like a little mushroom in a dark cave.”_

_“Ahahaha little mushroom girl!”_

_“Not even the fun kind of mushrooms.”_

_“Skinny, but in the gross way.”_

_“Skeleton.”_

_“She has to be a good lay though. Why else would he be hung up on her?”_

To Mal’s credit he glared down anyone who he caught being disrespectful to Alina. He would whisper reassuring things in her ear and wrap a protective arm around her waist. But that didn’t make the words go away and it never fully took the sting away.

She felt like she was drowning. Why wasn’t she happy? She should be happy. She had everything she had always wanted. Mal was finally hers, but instead of feeling buoyed by it she was dragged down to the depths.

It was worse when she thought about Morozova, so she didn’t. Or at least she tried her best not to. But even when she lied in Mal’s bed, it was Morozova’s face she saw staring out at her from the darkness. She craved his hands and his lips on her. The want ate her from the inside out, creating a ragged hole. And no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t ever fully fill it with Mal’s attention.

It wasn’t like he was bad in bed. In some ways he was too good. He dragged her body to the edge quickly then threw it over, almost as if he was getting her pleasure out of the way so he could have his. Every touch was practiced and calculated. Alina had thought that she would feel like the luckiest woman alive in Mal’s arms. Instead she felt like all the others. So many others.

She wasn’t sure if Mal knew that he wasn’t her first. He never asked and she never offered the information. But she was pretty sure that if he did know, he pretended otherwise.

Alina wished that she could pretend too, but more than that she wished that she wanted to pretend. Because of all the things that she regretted about the past few months, she couldn’t bring herself to regret the way she had spent her first time falling apart in Morozova’s arms.

Everything before and after, but not that.

~ ~ ~ ~

In the almost full year that they had been dating, Alina could count on one hand the number of actual dates that Mal had taken her on. She wouldn’t have been able to if she counted nights out at the bar, but she didn’t. She told herself that it didn’t bother her, that it was common for well-established couples to not go out on very many defined dates. But when Mal offered to take her to the theater she jumped at the chance. They both got dressed up and teased each other to giggling fits. She wore a nice blue dress and he wore his only collared shirt.

He had kept the details of the evening a secret, so Alina didn’t know what they were going to see until they got there. It turned out to be Annie the Musical. On the outside Alina was all smiles and excitement, but on the inside a little resigned part of wondered if this was all there was to them.

It was still a fun time though. They caught each other mouthing their favorite lyrics or lines and squeezed each other’s hands emphatically at particularly cringey parts. Alina was contently humming under her breath and thinking of all of the things they would have to discuss when the final song came around. Then Mal leaned over and whispered that he was going to go to the bathroom.

“It’s almost over. Can’t you wait?” She hissed.

“Nature calls.” He said with a wink.

Alina stared after him and wondered if he had lost his mind. A few minutes later though, it all became clear. The curtain fell to signal the end of the play, but when it rose back up for the actors to take their final bows there was only one person standing on the stage.

Much to the confusion of both Alina and the rest of the theater, Mal held a microphone at an awkward angle as he got down on one knee.

“Alina Starkov,” his voice boomed through the speakers, causing him to wince and position the microphone farther away. “You have always been there for me since the day we met. I hated every second in foster care and if it hadn’t been for you, I don’t think that I would have made it through. You are my sunshine and my tomorrow, even when I don’t deserve it.”

He gave a small chuckle. “Oh you’re going to hate me for this, but I _have_ to say it. We’re both poor as mice, but nothing could ever divide us.” Any other time she would have rolled her eyes at the way he had manipulated the famous song lyrics, but at the moment she was frozen in her chair. There were a few chuckles from the crowd.

He paused to take a fortifying breath and an intense fear gripped Alina heart. His voice was shaky, stretched thin with a nervousness she had never heard from him before. “You are the _only_ good thing to ever come out of being an orphan. The only. Good. Thing. I love you. So so much.” Another deep breath and then a distinctly wet chuckle. “I firmly believe that I don’t need anything but you. So would you do me the honor of becoming my wife?”

There was a part of her that was screaming, but that part was quickly wrestled into submission by her hope and optimism. This had to be what had been missing this past year. She just needed more commitment from Mal.

A giddy relief washed through her and she stood up to accept the thing that she thought she had always wanted.

“Yes!” She shouted as a bright spotlight fell on her. She winced and covered her eyes before making her way through the crowd. Once she got to the aisle she ran all the way to the stage, but at the base of it she found that there weren’t any stairs. Mal leaned over the edge to offer her a hand and a stage bouncer helped lift her up. The process was embarrassingly clumsy and Alina wasn’t completely sure that she hadn’t flashed a few people, but once she was on the stage and in Mal’s arms, none of it seemed to mater.

The crowd cheered when they kissed and then they cheered even louder when Mal got down on one knee again to present her the ring.

It was thin and didn’t even have a gem. She loved it anyways. Alina put it on then Mal grabbed her hand and held it up like she had just won a wrestling match.

The weight in her heart didn’t go away, but it shifted in a way that made it feel lighter.

Alina really thought that would be enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for sticking with me so far! I know that this is the rough part of the fic, but yeah... character development and all that. (Don't murder me!)
> 
> You guys have all been so amazing with your comments and I'm so so grateful for your support. It means the world to me. I started out this fic back in June when there was about 240 fics in this fandom. It was at the bottom of the pile. And now it's the 20th most read fic out of about 320. (I finally made it to the front page when you sort the fics in this fandom by hits is what I'm getting at. ^^; I'm a competitive nerd, so this is probably a bigger deal to me than it should be... ) 
> 
> Seriously though, I look at your guys' comments when I'm feeling stuck on this fic, or down in general, and they really help me. <3
> 
> I hoped you enjoyed this chapter and are having a lovely day!


	23. This Is It

Aleks had always prided himself on being able to make and carry out his plans with ease. He was good at accounting for every possible variable and adjusting when needed. Even people, notoriously unwieldly and unpredictable, were easy enough for him to manipulate. He very rarely made mistakes and because of that he had prospered.

Expensive car, well taken care of mother, penthouse apartment, nice job, lucrative hobby, and two perfectly obedient dogs. Everything in Aleksander Morozova’s life was arranged into a neat line that pointed towards even more success.

And then Alina had blazed into his life, bright and volatile. He had seen her talent and wanted to take advantage of it. But as he wrapped her up in a tangled net, closer and closer to him, she had taken those same bindings and tied loops around him as well. It was slow and almost imperceptible, until she broke free. Then she left him tripping over his own shoe laces.

It took him a while to figure out how it had happened, how she had been so cunning, much longer than he would like to admit. If he had been any other person, thought any other way it would have been obvious from the start.

The simple fact was that Alina hadn’t been cunning at all.

Aleks was a planner, a plotter even. But Alina? She met life head on and let it wash over her. She was unpredictable because she didn’t have motives, not like he did. Goals and dreams, yes. Wants and need, of course. But not the ugly, greedy demands that he ran on.

It still should never have happened the way it had. At first the only motive was the exhibit, the recognition and profit it would bring. Then, somewhere along the way, she became a motive as well. The contract was only meant as a backup, insurance that she wouldn’t try to take their work somewhere else. It would have been his upper hand or incentive, not a means to control her outright. (Of course it could also be used that way, Aleks would never let that sort of opportunity slip by him.) But he had thought that he wouldn’t have need to use it. When she had signed the contract he had dared to hope that meant she trusted him.

She didn’t though, not at all, and especially not anymore. All it had taken was a few minutes with his mother and she ran right out of his life and straight into someone else’s. It was a matter of hours and she was no longer his alone. He may have tried to tie her down, but she had betrayed him the first chance that she got.

Aleks clutched his phone tightly in his hand and fought the urge to chuck it across the room. He had just been checking the financial section of the Ravkan Times, when a stray advertisement for another article caught his eye. It was a picture of a man prosing to a woman who looked like she was fighting back tears of joy.

ORPHANS FIND LOVE!

_Young man surprises his childhood sweetheart and fellow orphan at Annie Musical with incredibly romantic proposal. Click here if you want to cry today!_

Aleks most certainly did not ‘want to cry today’ but he clicked the link anyways. The article was a short blurb riddled with Annie related puns and lacking in any real information. The real draw though was shaky footage of the proposal, obviously captured on a phone.

He watched it over and over again until the words were seared into his ears and the images branded onto his eyes. He didn’t cry though, he was both too empty and too proud for that.

 _More._ There was a deep ache inside of him for it, a need and a desperation for more. But even when he had it, it was never enough.

Except with Alina. There had been brief moments of time with her that had felt breathlessly, effortlessly perfect. The sight of her asleep on the couch, snuggled up next to Volcra and Vo’ya. The feel of her hand in his as he shared a painting technique. The long line of her throat when she threw her head back in laughter. The gentle sound of sheets rustling as she shifted beside him in his bed.

And now she was out of his life and the ache was worse than ever. She had been gone for months, yet she still saturated his life. It was just little things that she had left behind or tiny changes that she had made, but that didn’t make them hurt any less. There were the obvious things- a spare toothbrush in the bathroom, an expired carton of coconut milk in the fridge, a forgotten hoody with a hole in the elbow, an extra stool and canvas in the studio- and then there were the less obvious things- a throw blanket that used to lay over an arm chair that nove lived on the back of his sofa, the kitchen cabinets rearranged so a shorter person could reach them without being teased, the hurtful look in his dogs’ eyes when he came home alone again and again.

He should have gotten rid of anything she had left behind or reversed any of her changes by now, but there was an intense feeling of exhaustion that came over him whenever he tried. Aleksander had never been an “I’ll do it tomorrow” kind of person, he wouldn’t be as successful if he was. But when it came to things like the image of her pulling a silly face as his phone’s screensaver, he couldn’t bring himself to breath let alone change it.

He was weak. Alina had made him weak with a want that he couldn’t fill. But it was a weakness that he refused to admit to anyone else, let alone the person who had caused it. He wouldn’t bring himself down to that degrading level.

He had told her that he didn’t share.

And of all the things Aleksander Morozova had done to Alina, he had never lied to her.

~ ~ ~ ~

“Well, I kind of wanted to go with sunflowers for the bouquet, but Mal says that he doesn’t really like them. They _are_ kind of much I guess and definitely expensive. Plus, Mal says-”

“Would you just, stop it already? I’m not talking to Mal right now!” Genya set her mug down with more force than was strictly necessary. Tea sloshed over the side and Alina looked at her friend in confused alarm.

“What? Why aren’t you talking to Mal?”

“No! That’s not what I meant. I just-” Genya cut herself off with a distressed noise in the back of her throat. “What I’m trying to say is that I’m talking to _you_ right now, not him. I’m sick to death of hearing ‘what Mal thinks’ or ‘what Mal said.’ I want to know _your_ opinions, not his.”

Alina’s felt her face warm with irritation. “Well, maybe Mal and I just have the same opinions. Did you ever think of that?”

“But you don’t though. Not really!”

“We do too! Mal-”

Genya cut her off with an accusatory finger. “There! I bet you were just about to tell me yet another thing about Mal. You can’t go two minutes without bringing him up.”

“Well it’s pretty hard talk about wedding plans when you can’t talk about the groom.” Alina retorted tersely. A thought struck her though and her voice shifted to concern. “What is up with you today? Did you and David have a fight?”

Genya set her palms down on the table and took a bracing inhalation. “No. This isn’t about me and David. Hell, this isn’t even about Mal. This is about you. What are you doing, Alina?”

“Well I was drinking tea with my Maid of Honor while we discussed my upcoming wedding. But I guess that’s not what we are doing anymore.”

“Alina.”

Alina sat back in her chair roughly and let out an exasperated sigh. “If you have something to say, Genya, just say it. I’m not a mind reader and you’re honestly starting to freak me out.”

“Are you happy?”

“Of course I am.”

“No. I want you to really think about it. Are you happy? Is this enough for you?”

Alina’s eyes narrow. “Why wouldn’t this be enough for me?”

Genya fell silent and looked at Alina pointedly.

“If you think that I’m still heartbroken over Morozova then you are dead wrong. I’m fine- no, I’m more than fine. _I’m happy_.”

More silence.

“Mal is better than Morozova ever was! I mean, yeah sometimes he can be a bit distant. Especially lately… but he’s just under a lot of stress at work! He has to work such long hours and that security guard job wasn’t a good fit for him from the start, but with the wedding coming up he feels like he can’t quit it… Why would you even suggest- He never- I just- You know what? I’m done talking about this.” Alina huffed, crossed her arms, and turned away from Genya like a petulant two-year-old.

Genya stood up and crossed to Alina’s side of the table. Warm arms wrapped around her and her friend spoke softly. “It’s okay you know, if this isn’t enough for you. You can call it off. You don’t have to do anything just because Mal-”

Alina shook her off. “Why do you think this isn’t enough for me? Where is this coming from?”

“Well for one, I didn’t bring up Morozova, you did. And two? You haven’t done any kind of art since that night at the gallery. And if I know you at all, I know that a Happy Alina can’t stand being away from her sketch book for more than two minutes.”

“Well, maybe you don’t know me then!” Alina’s hands fluttered in the air. “Just because you are dating some weird little gremlin-”

Genya gasped. “He is _not_ a gremlin! Saints, Alina! I’m dating somebody who actually cares about me and pays me a speck of attention-”

“He didn’t used to. You had to practically prostrate yourself at his feet before he even looked at you! You never did tell me how you got him to kiss you. What, did you flash him or something?”

A chilly silence took over the room and Alina immediately wanted to take back what she had said.

Genya drew herself up to her full height, towering over Alina who was still sitting at the table. Her voice was eerily calm.  “I liked it better when Mal didn’t even know you existed. At least you made your own life choices then. Oh sure, they revolved around chasing him like a lovesick puppy, but they were still _your_ choices. Now you just let him walk all over you and I can’t stand it. Why can’t you just tell him that you want fucking sunflowers in your bouquet, or that you don’t want want the world’s smallest wedding, or that you don’t want to live in this house that is literally falling apart.”

“This isn’t about Morozova. Although I don’t believe a word you say about being over him. This is about you being a doormat. This is about all the art you have shoved under your bed. This is about you being so desperately unhappy that all you can do is smile weakly and say ‘ _I’m fine. I’m happy._ ’ At least you used to know that you hated your life, now you can’t even tell that you’re drowning.”

Tears streamed down both of their faces and Alina continued to sit, shell shocked.

“I can’t- I can’t watch this anymore.” Genya choked over the words.

“Then don’t.”

“Alina.”

“You’re out of the wedding.”

“But-”

“GET OUT.”

Genya opened her mouth like she wanted to say more, but something in Alina’s expression must have stopped her. She turned on her heel and marched out of the kitchen, only barely managing to remember to grab her jacket off of the back of her chair.

Alina didn’t move again until her tea had long gone cold.

~ ~ ~ ~

Nikolai  
>> Alinaaaaaaaaa! It’s been forever. How is wedding planning? Come get coffee with me and tell me all about it, I know all the best places!  
>> I’ll give you a hint, I own them. <(￣︶￣)>

“Why are you still talking to him? I thought you hated him!” Mal yelled at Alina.

Saints, she hated it when he yelled. It caused her hands to sweat and a headache to bloom behind her eyes. Normally she would try to make herself small and placating, at least until the anger passed. But the fight with Genya was still fresh and her accusing voice was at the back of her head. _You just let him walk all over you._

Alina might still be furious at Genya, but she kind of had a point, especially when it came to Mal’s reaction to Nikolai. Besides, she was currently down one friend and Alexei was feigning selective hearing loss whenever she talked about the wedding. Alina needed somebody to talk to.

She fixed a cool glare at Mal. “He made it up to me a while ago. We’re friends again. _Friends_.”

“What does that mean, ‘he made it up to you?’” His eyes narrowed and she could practically see his imagination running wild.

“Stop being so nasty, Mal. You have female friends. I’m allowed male friends too!”

“Well I haven’t kissed any of my female friends.” He groused and crossed his arms petulantly.

Alina rolled her eyes. “I know for a fact that you have made out with all of them. I’ve lived with you for years, Mal. I’ve _seen_ it. And I happen to recall that you’ve made out with Ruby at least twice.”

He continued to pout.

“Maaal,” She gently worked to uncross his arms. “Come on. I promise that we are just friends.”

He seemed to soften for a moment, then frowned even more. “Let me see your phone then.”

Alina’s eyes went wide with disbelief. “No.”

“Why not?”

“On principle. I’m not showing you my phone so you can search pointlessly for something that isn’t there!”

Mal’s eyes flitted to the table where her phone rested.

He lunged.

She lunged.

The phone skittered from the table and fell to the floor with a sickening crack.

They both froze, hands outstretched in their futile attempts to grab the phone first. After a long moment, Mal moved first. Hesitantly, he picked the phone off the floor. He flipped it over in his hands gently, like it might crumble with the slightest wrong touch. There was a long crack from the bottom left of the screen to the top right. He pressed the home button and the screen lit up. It was damaged, but not completely broken.

Alina felt the sharp sting of unexpected tears start to well in her eyes. She remembered the solid feel of sitting on cold granite as a warm body leaned into her. She felt the rumbling ghost of a growl pressed against her lips as she swore to return a cellphone.

“I’m sorry, Alina. I just-”

She snatched the phone from his hands.

“You just _what_ , Mal? When are you going to let this go and just trust me? I’m with you. I love _you._ Why can’t you just believe me? I’ve never even thought of cheating on you!”

“Because I-” Mal started to yell something then cut himself off abruptly by raking an exasperated hand over his face. When he continued his voice was quieter, but sharper than ever. “You cheated on Morozova. Once a cheater, always a cheater.”

She gasped as if he had struck her across the face. It probably would have stung less if he had.

His eyes went wide after he said it and he immediately tried to backtrack, but the damage was already done. His callous words caused just the slightest shift in Alina’s heart. It was only the movement of a small pebble, yet the fragile supports she had built to carry the heaviness in her heart finally started to creak under the weight.

~ ~ ~ ~

Alina felt a bit like one of those bobble heads that truckers keep on their dashboards. She continued to nod along absentmindedly to whatever Nikolai was chattering about. Every once in a while she would interject a ‘yeah’ or ‘uh-huh’ or even a few ‘totally’s.

She wasn’t trying to be rude, she really wasn’t, it was just hard to concentrate on the individual words that Nikolai was saying when so other many things were tumbling around in her mind. It was much easier to let just the sound of his voice surround her as she took small, careful sips of her latte.

“Alina? I know you haven’t been paying attention for, like, the last five minutes but I have something very important to say.”

Caught red-handed, Alina worked to focus her eyes on Nikolai’s. There was a tug on the permanent knot of anxiety in her stomach and she braced herself for whatever serious thing he was about to say.

“How are men like coffee?”

Alina looked at him blankly. She wasn’t sure if it was a rhetorical question, but if it wasn’t she had absolutely no answer for him. Nikolai leaned forward in his seat slowly and his eyebrows knit together like he was about to let her in on a grave secret.

“The best ones are rich, hot, and can keep you up all night.”

Alina spluttered a cry of indignation and narrowly avoided spitting up her coffee. “Nikolai Sturmhond Lantsov!” She admonished him. His only response was to waggle his eyebrows at her.

She found herself laughing despite herself. It was nice. _This_ was nice. The fact that they could now joke about both Nikolai being rich and at one point pretending to be a plumber with the last name Strumhond, was amazing. A year ago, Alina wouldn’t have thought it possible. But just as she had thought on that wretched snowy night, Nikolai had earned back her trust and more.

“There was actually something I wanted to talk to you about though.” The seriousness was back in Nikolai’s tone and now in his eyes as well. He hesitated for a moment. “It’s about Morozova. I’ve debated with myself as to whether or not I should even bring this up, but I thought you would want to know.”

Alina sat perfectly still, her breath lodged painfully in her chest. It seemed cruel to her that she could go almost a year without hearing that name aloud, only to hear it twice in one week.

“He’s resigned as CMO of The Ravkan Brew.”

Alina felt like she was being sucker punched repeatedly in her stomach.

“There were a lot of rumors and accusations floating around- some of which I have to admit I contributed to- about him breaking his contract.”

_Punch._

“Specifically, the clauses that bound him exclusively to our company.”

_Punch._

“There was never any definitive proof, but it was pretty clear that he had some major involvement with The Drüskelle Coffee Company and may have even given them insider secrets.”

_Punch, punch._

Little pieces of paper started to little the table as Alina furiously, but absentmindedly picked at her coffee cup sleeve. Nikolai frowned. “Of course the bastard resigned before we could build enough of a case to fire him. But still, he’s left the company. I’ve actually… well, I’ve been promoted to take over his job.”

Nikolai ran a hand through his hair and Alina suddenly realized that he was probably really worried about how she would react to this news. She took a deep breath then pushed aside the turmoil of her thoughts and emotions about Morozova. It was a practiced motion almost easy at this point, but her smile for Nikolai was still weak. “That’s fantastic. For you, I mean, I guess it isn’t really great for Al- Morozova.”

There was an awkward pause where Alina and Nikolai both tried ignore her almost slip up with the Literal Devil’s name.

“Congratulations though. I know how much your family’s company means to you, so this is huge. And well, the stuff around the promotion is… uncomfortable for me to think about, but… yeah. Congrats!” She gave him a halfhearted thumbs-up.

Nikolai seemed to accept her less than enthusiastic congratulations and continued to talk about the promotion and what it meant for him, all the while carefully tip-toeing around anything to do with Morozova. Eventually the conversation shifted back to Alina and the wedding.

“So have you finally settled on a color scheme?” He asked her.

“I fired Genya.” She suddenly blurted out.

“What do you mean you ‘fired Genya?’” Nikolai’s tone was equal parts confused and concerned.

Alina looked out of the corner of her eyes dejectedly. “She’s not my Maid of Honor anymore.”

“What happened?”

“We had a fight.” She replied cryptically.

“Yes, well, obviously, but about what?”

“She doesn’t think I’m happy.”

Nikolai seemed to turn over her words in his mind for a moment before deciding on his response. “Well, _are_ you happy?” He finally asked.

She picked at her coffee cup sleeve. By that point the thing was barely holding on for dear life, only a few more scratches away from falling completely apart. The table was absolutely littered with little brown shavings.

 _Pick, pick, pick_. The flimsy cardboard fell apart under her fingers.

Alina’s voice was quiet and small, that of a mouse or a little mushroom girl, “I don’t know what I would do without Mal.”

Nikolai paused to think over her words again. He reached out to still her hands which had continued to pick at the cardboard even after it fell off her cup. Alina looked up and he fixed her with serious stare. His hazel eyes were so calm and understanding that she had to fight the urge to look away.

When he looked at her like that, the weight on her heart seemed to increase exponentially. She looked at him anyways.

“Alina. You would live your life.”

~ ~ ~ ~

Alina had no idea what she was doing here. She clutched a laminated menu in both hands, but she didn’t really see it. She felt like she was doing something dangerous, her heart beat a frantic rhythm in her ears and her legs itched to run. This was stupid. She was stupid. He could show up at any moment and then what would she do?

At the table next to her a kid accidentally dropped his spoon on the table creating a disproportionately loud noise. Alina jumped in her seat.

“Well aren’t you a twitchy little thing?” A voice sounded next to her and she yelped as she whipped her head away from the table with the noisy kid.

Baghra.

The two women stared at each other, each seemingly assessing the other’s silence. Baghra stood tall, one hand propped on her cane, and wore an impassive mask. Alina sat huddled and small in her booth, trying to look annoyed, but really just looking nervous.

Alina opened her mouth to say something, anything, that would get them out of this awkward situation. But Baghra beat her too it by snapping, “What do you want?” She did not say it in the usual bright tone of a fresh waiter or even in the deadened tone of a tired waiter. Instead it was harsh and hostile. She didn’t want to know what Alina wanted to eat, she wanted to know why she was here.

“Banana waffles.” Alina replied flatly, knowing full well that it wasn’t the answer that Baghra wanted.

The severe woman, who only looked even sterner with a paper food service hat pinned to her coal black hair pulled into a tight bun, harrumphed and snatched the menu from Alina’s hands.

 _Typical Baghra._ Alina thought and the familiarity of it warmed her slightly and made her feel bolder. “And some coffee please!” She called after the waiter’s retreating form, only to earn another gruff harrumph in response.

Without the menu to occupy her hands, Alina started to pick at her cuticles. She glanced around the restaurant nervously. It was early in the morning, almost ridiculously so, and there were only a few occupied tables. There was a tired looking trucker in the corner who looked like he might fall asleep mid bite, two girls about Alina’s age in messy party dresses still laughing despite their obviously long night (or maybe because of it), an older gentleman eating a simple plate of fruit and oatmeal as he did a Sudoku, and the family next to her just barely keeping their child’s temper in check.

Alina let herself breathe a little sigh of relief. Morozova wasn’t going to show up at 6 AM on a Sunday morning. Sure, he could get up early with ease, and often did for work, but Alina knew that deep down he was a night person. Also, he wasn’t working anymore, at least not for The Ravkan Brew. A spike of panic went through her. She hadn’t talked to Morozova in over a year, why would she assume that his schedule was the same? Especially if he changed jobs.

She rested her head in her hands as she fought back a groan. _What am I doing here?_ She thought to herself. It hadn’t taken a small amount of effort to get to this restaurant either. Alina had to first lie to her fiancé about where she was going – _ugh, I can’t believe they called me in to work the Sunday morning shift!_ – and then she had to take two buses to cross to the other side of Os Alta. It had taken her forty-five minutes to get here and with every minute her anxiety and impulse to turn around had grown exponentially.

Yet here she sat, not so patiently waiting for her ex’s mother to bring her banana pancakes.

_I liked it better when Mal didn’t even know you existed._

_Once a cheater, always a cheater._

_He’s resigned as CMO of The Ravkan Brew._

_You would live your life._

_You just let him walk all over you and I can’t stand it._

_Are you happy?_

_Well, are you?_

_Tell the truth._

_You can tell me._

_Are you happy?_

A steaming tower of pancakes was placed in front of Alina, jolting her out of her swirling thoughts. By the time she looked up, Baghra’s back was already turned and she had hustled half way across the restaurant.

She carefully cut into the pancakes and took a bite. They looked perfect. They tasted like ash. Alina washed them down with black coffee. She could only bring herself to eat a third of the stack until she had to admit defeat and set her knife and fork down on her plate. A young looking waiter whose nametag proudly read “Misha” in clumsy permanent marker politely asked her if she would like a box.

“No, I’m fine. I have a long way home anyways, it would be difficult with a takeout box. More coffee maybe?”

He nodded with a smile and practically skipped away. Absentmindedly Alina wondered how a woman as sour as Baghra had gotten a waiter as cheery as Misha.

Four cups of coffee, a precariously constructed pyramid of empty coffee creamers, and two shredded napkins later, Baghra came to stand over Alina’s table.

“Okay that’s it. Either buy another meal or pay your bill and get out.”

There was nothing warm or inviting about Baghra’s tone, posture, or face, but Alina was suddenly blurting out a very personal statement.

“I think I’m going to break it off with my fiancé.”

Baghra’s eyebrows lifted upwards in surprise ever so slightly before falling even further down into a dour scowl. She crossed her arms. “What do you mean _you think_?”

“I- I don’t know…” She stared down at the table miserably.

The older woman made an agitated sound at the back of her throat that was closer to a growl than usual. To Alina’s surprise she slid into the other side of the booth. The coffee carafe she was holding tilted precarious as she settled angrily into her seat, but at the last moment she jerked it upright with a a practiced snap of her wrist and set on the table without spilling a drop.

“It should go without saying, but I’ll say it anyways. You girl, are an idiot.”

Alina’s cheeks heated, but she couldn’t bring herself to protest.

Baghra seemed to soften ever so slightly. It must not have been as much fun to insult a person who had already beaten themselves into the ground.

“What are you doing here? And don’t say that you don’t know, because you do. You probably just wish you didn’t.”

Alina reached over to grab another napkin to shred, but stopped when she saw the murderous look in Baghra’s eyes.

“I used to be in love with Mal. I really did. He was my best friend, my family, _my everything_. And then he was pulling away from me and it was so painful. Every day I felt like I had a knife in my chest, but Aleksander…” His name on her lips felt awkward after all this time, but comforting somehow. “Aleksander made me forget, made me feel important, supported me.”

“And then he betrayed you.”

“And then he betrayed me.” Alina repeated softly. “Mal was suddenly there though. Right when I needed him the most, he picked up the pieces and put me back together. All of the things he did to hurt me fell away and I thought that everything would be okay. But it’s not. He was perfect for me, until Aleksander… broke me.”

“Broke you? What are you some child’s plaything? A choking hazard made of flimsy plastic?”

“No, of course not!”

“Then stop acting like it. This moping is pathetic. You broke my son’s heart and you don’t see him crying into his pickled herring.”

“Broke his heart?” The words came out jagged and incredulous. “He never really- How could I have- he stole my art!”

Baghra leaned back, her eyes narrowed slightly. “Maybe it seems like there is only one villain in your story, but don’t you dare think for a second that you are the only victim.”

Alina’s mouth opened and shut a few times. “What the hell does that even mean?”

“Give it some time. You’ll figure it out eventually, idiot though you are.”

Alina wanted to grab the carafe of coffee sitting on the table and hit Baghra over the head with it. Instead she watched as Baghra picked it up herself and rose to her feet.

“Now then. This has been _fun_.” She said the word with distain. “I can’t sort your life out for you. I will say this though. It sounds less like your fiancé is helping you and more like he is using you. Alina, you need to start learning the difference and stop letting these idiotic men rule your life. Saints know that you are fool enough on your own without them.”

The woman walked away, leaving Alina feeling like she had been both set on her feet and turned on her head.

“Umm, Ma’am?”

Alina turned to see Misha looking at her nervously.

“Baghra wants you to leave now. She says that you don’t have to pay, but if you stay any longer she’s going to call the cops… and she said ‘not the nice ones either,’ although I’m not sure what that means.”

“You and me both, Misha. You and me both.”

Alina left a large tip on the table anyways, it rested on a napkin that said, “ _Thanks old hag, but this is for Misha.”_

The back of it also said something.

_“I’m sorry. Please don’t tell.”_

Alina didn’t have to specify whom.

~ ~ ~ ~

A few days later Alina waited in the kitchen for Mal to come home from work. She wasn’t quite sure why the kitchen. Maybe it was because it didn’t have a TV or a bed or a toilet. Maybe it was because it felt like neutral ground or it already felt like a fighting arena.

He wasn’t due home for hours after she had made it home from the dinner, but she waited there anyways, not moving from her rickety dinning chair. All the while she thought of what she wanted to say, what she didn’t want to say, and what had to be said regardless of what she felt. However, the moment he walked through the doorway, all of the things she had prepared flew out of her head leaving her with only one sentence.

“This isn’t working.”

The words stopped him dead in his tracks, almost as if he had run into an invisible brick wall. Mal’s bright blue eyes went wide in shock for a moment, then turned grim and dark. He seemed to debate over something before finally sitting down across from her.

Alina was prepared for tears, accusations, and yelling. She anticipated blazing anger and raging grief. On her tongue were rebuttals for either poorly veiled or outright insults. She had spent all day fortifying herself against it, while at the same time wondering how it had come to this. But what he had to say still knocked down all of the weight bearing supports and scaffolding in her heart. He met her anxious stare with calm resignation. He propped his elbows on the table and folded his fingers together.

“I agree.”

The weight on her heart hovered hesitantly buoyed by tenuous hope.

Mal continued, “So how are we going to fix this?”

No. Of course it couldn’t be that easy. And yet, in a way it was. Finally, _finally_ , the weight that had settle on her her heart came crashing down. It fell apart, unraveling like an old sweater or crumbling like a child’s sandcastle. There were deep grooves in her heart where it had rested and little parts of it still clung to her with guilt, but finally, _finally, finally_ she was set free.

“We aren’t. I can’t do this anymore.” Her words were shaky, but her tone was decided.

“Why?”

“Because I’m not me when I’m with you.”

“But I love you! And you love me too. You said so yourself.” He said accusingly. And Alina could see how he had wielded his love as a sword and hers a shield.

“You’re right.” She said, her agreement caught him off guard so she continued. “I have always loved you and you me. But as for being in love? We never matched up.”

He sat in stony silence and Alina softened her already calm tone. “Mal, when did you start to know that you were in love with me?”

Tentatively, as if he was afraid she would smack him away, he grabbed her scarred hand. “It was that night, the one with the big windstorm. I couldn’t stand it that you hurt yourself, when I wasn’t there for you.”

His finger ran along the raised edge. Alina squeezed his hand gently, then withdrew it from him. “Oh Mal. I had been in love with you since we were in middle school, maybe even a little longer. But you never saw me. Not until you thought I was dating other guys. Don’t you see how unfair that is? I watched you date countless women for years and never judged you for it. You watched it for a minute and immediately turned on me.”

“And that’s when you stopped being in love with me.” He said miserably.

Alina turned the words over in her head. They didn’t fit though. “No, it wasn’t that, although it didn’t help. Maybe this isn’t fair, because I never said anything, never spoke up, but you haven’t been treating me right for years.”

He opened his mouth to protest, but Alina cut him off. “No. I need to say this. Please, just let me talk. Ever since we moved into this house our relationship started to change. You had less time for me and when you did it was because you didn’t have any other options. You let Mikhael and Dubrov walk all over me, Zoya too. It wasn’t just that either. You stopped helping around the house, you stopped checking in on how I was, you just… stopped. And it hurt.”

She took a long breath, building up to her final point. “I know you didn’t mean to, never would. And I know I didn’t say anything, but _I shouldn’t have needed to_. So, that’s when I started to fall out of love with you, when I realized that you could hurt me so thoroughly and not even realize what you were doing. Does that make sense?”

Mal was quiet for a while, not agreeing, but not disagreeing either. “You changed too you know. You had that job at the greeting card company, your ‘big break,’ and when that fell through, you were so depressed. I tried Alina, I really did, and I think you know. But nothing I did seemed to work, so I guess I did stop trying. But so did you.”

Alina wanted to argue with him, because it wasn’t the same thing, not really. But she held back. This was the most sincere conversation they had probably ever had, and the only way to keep it going would be to compromise.

“Maybe we’re both in the wrong, hurting each other without meaning to. But that doesn’t change the fact that I can’t marry you. It’s not something that can be fixed, but I hope that you can at least know that I wish it was. And you will _always_ be my family, no matter what.”

He made a sad strangled sound in the back of his throat. “But I want more.”

“I know.” She replied simply, “But I don’t have any more to give. And when I try to give more or you try to take more it slowly kills me. I don’t want that and you can’t possibly want that either.”

“No. I would never… But I- but we-” The strangled sound returned and bloomed into something more. Large tears rolled down Mal’s face, the kind that Alina hadn’t seen since their childhood.

Alina got up and crossed over to his side of the table. She wrapped him into a hug and cried too. They clung to each other as they mourned the loss of something that never really was. Something that had the chance to be, but wasn’t.

Even though they had tried.

Mal was right and he was wrong. Alina was wrong and she was right. It was unfair for both of them and they knew it, could feel it acutely, but it didn’t change the fact that it was.

As painful as it was, it was also good, liberating. Alina had been so afraid of losing Mal that she had dug herself into a deep, flawed hole. She had shut herself away from the world and its possibilities. At the same time, she had focused on everything but her pain festering under the surface. Alina closed it all up firmly inside her, waiting for the day that Mal would open the doors of her own creation. But instead of opening them, he took the keys and hid them away, because was afraid of losing her too.

Alina’s mind swirled with these tangled thoughts, confusing analogies, and muddled metaphors. She voiced some of them to Mal and kept others to herself. He paid her back in kind. They talked and cried and sat in silence all night, until the sunrise found them in Alina’s bedroom. They were on her bed with their backs to the wall and their legs stretched out in front of them. He let her rest her head on his shoulder. The thin sunlight warmed her closed eyes.

“So I guess this is it.”

“Yeah.”

Alina took off her ring and Mal put it in his pocket.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew! That was long and a lot. I hope that you guys liked it though! Let me know in the comments down below! (Also if you see any typos, please tell me. I got pretty tired by the end of this lol)
> 
> ♡
> 
> ~Btw I _finally_ made myself a [Tumblr](https://smiling-penelope.tumblr.com/). So if you have one go find me and do whatever stuff ya do on tumblr! (I'm actually not certain _what_ that is soooooo...)~


	24. Bitch Baby

“I don’t know… isn’t it a bit _much_?” Alina asked Genya and Tamar in voice that was pitched slightly higher with anxiety and made echoey from the tiled bathroom.  She looked in the mirror with wide eyes and turned her head slowly back and forth to inspect the new light color of her hair.

“It’s perfect.” Genya reassured Alina with a pat to her shoulder.

“I’d fuck you!” Shouted Tamar from her seated position on the closed toilet seat. It was girl’s night in and seeing as she wasn’t on the giving or receiving end of a life changing hair makeover Tamar was already a few drinks ahead. Cheerily she lifted her glass of mijiu and toasted Alina’s reflection.

Alina made an uncertain noise and bit her lip. The girl in the mirror didn’t look anywhere near confident enough to rock her new bright white hair. She lifted a hank of it, still wet and stringy, and inspected it closer. _Does it have to be so droopy?_

Genya slapped her hand away, maybe a bit harder than necessary. The two of them were on much friendlier terms since their reconciliation, but there was still a bit of pent up aggression between them. It was nothing that would do lasting damage to their relationship, but both women were proud and prone to holding grudges. That combined with their intimate knowledge of the other’s insecurities could be a dangerous mix.

But even in the midst of their fight, Alina had known that Genya was just trying to help. If anything that had made it worse. The light Genya had shined on the flaws in her life had only burned all the more for its honesty. So Alina, already scared and hurting, lashed out with her biggest weapon first.

“Of all people, Alina, I would have thought that you would be the last to throw that in my face.” It was the day after Alina had broken off her engagement with Mal. She had gone to Genya’s house because she need a friend, her best friend. And even though she was still hurt, she knew that at the foundation of their argument, Genya was right and Alina was wrong.

Still, a little part of Alina smarted. She didn’t like being wrong and _did she have to be so mean about it?_ But then Genya’s voice broke into something sharp and fragile that made a deep slash in Alina’s heart, “You _know_ what I’ve had to deal with ever since I hit puberty and people started to want things from me. The weight of their stares as they decide who I am by the shape of my body before the words on my lips. You knew how important it was to me that David could appreciate me for who I am and not how I look. But you threw it in my face anyways, made me feel small, made me feel like all the nasty things people have always whispered about me. And it fucking hurt. All because I was trying to _help_ you.”

“I know, I’m sorry. You were just saying all the things I didn’t want to hear, all the right things, but I was too scared to hear them, because I didn’t want them to be true. I know that’s an excuse, but… I’m sorry. I don’t think that way about you, I never have.”

Genya made a disgruntled noise of disbelief, but Alina kept going. “It was just in that moment everything in your life seemed perfect and everything in mine broken. I had this ugly, messed up urge to drag you down and… I’m so sorry.”

Genya had looked at her with tight eyes and folded arms, not quite ready to accept Alina’s apology. Probably because she knew it wasn’t complete. Genya’s eyes were challenging her, prodding her to ‘go on.’

“I cheated on Morozova.” Alina blurted out. “That night at the gallery, that same night, I went straight from him to Mal.”

Genya finally softened a little, her arms loosened and her eyes widened with concern. But Alina didn’t see it, couldn’t see it, because she was looking away from her friend in shame. She had never told anyone, not even Mal, the specifics of what she had done.

She struggled a little to get out her next words, “I slept with both of them… on the same night. I- Does that make me… a slut?”

Alina winced as she said the word and it was a long moment were it just hung in the air between them.

Genya sighed.

“Well I don’t really like that you are asking me like I’m some kind of expert on it-”

Alina opened her mouth to protest because she didn’t think that way, not at all, but her friend cut her off, “No, I know what you mean. It’s just, to be honest, I don’t even know what that word really means. I mean, yeah sure, you could look up some dictionary definition carefully crafted by some perverted old white guys and it would probably say something like ‘a woman who sleeps with a lot of men.’ But what is a lot of men? Who decides that line? It’s definitely not me and I wouldn’t want it to be.”

Alina wrapped her arms around her torso, bowing into herself to become as small as she felt she should be. “Well, I feel like I’m a slut… for doing that. I know I was upset, but I just hopped right into Mal’s bed without even talking to Al-Morozova, and then he caught me the next morning and he… he did _nothing_ , he just left without saying anything and I-” Her words broke off into a sob.

Then, like only the best of friends do – even when they are mad as all hell – Genya wrapped Alina up into a big hug and let her cry. She led her away from the entry way of her apartment and sat her down on her sofa so that she could go make her a big cup of black coffee. When she put the warm mug in Alina’s hands she stared at it numbly.

Genya took a bracing sip of her own then set it aside. “Okay, I really _really_ don’t want to bring this up, what with how it ended last time, but… you have to break it off with Mal.” She rushed out the last part of her sentence then continued on before Alina had a chance to speak. “I mean you said it yourself, I was saying all the right things, so you clearly have already realized that you aren’t happy with him. And I feel like your real dilemma isn’t whether or not you are a… sexually promiscuous woman… but whether you cheated on Morozova. You’re still hung up on him, you have to be, otherwise I don’t think you would be this torn up about morality, especially not after what he did to you. I mean-”

“I already broke up with him.” Alina whispered, but Genya continued on, not having heard her.

“- after you found out about that disgusting contract it was kind of implicit that you weren’t dating anymore, so it could be easily argued that you didn’t actually cheat. Yet here you are tearing yourself up about it and-”

“I’m not engaged to Mal anymore.” Alina said with more force.

“What?”

“We broke it off last night.”

Alina could see a war breaking out on Genya’s face as she fought to conceal her pure elation. It made her look like she was either sucking on an egg or had just eaten something deliciously sour. In a slow hesitant voice, she asked, “How do you feel about that?”

Alina sighed, “It sucks… but I think it’s for the best.”

Genya’s face burst into a gleeful smile. “Saints, Alina! You could have led with that. I feel like I’ve been lecturing you for the last hour. This is great though! Fantastic news. I was really nervous there for a second. I mean it was just so obvious that he wasn’t the one for you, but you were making yourself miserable for him anyways.” Genya breathed a heavy sigh of relief and put a hand to her chest. “Wow, I don’t think I’ve ever been so relieved in my life.”

“Tell me how you really feel, why don’t you?” Alina grumbled.

“Oh Alina, I’m sorry. I’m just so happy though! Wait-” Her face darkened. “Do I need to go get a shovel?”

She waved her friend off. “No, no. Nothing like that. There’s no villain here, we’re both just hurting right now, and probably will be for a while. It was pretty amicable though, all things considered.”

Genya wrapped Alina up into another big hug. “I’m so proud of you!”

Alina resisted the urge to say ‘well that makes one of us.’ Because while the heavy weight of pretending to love Mal the way she used to had lifted, she was still left with a tangled soul. It was going to take time to comb through the knots. In that moment on Genya’s couch, Alina was still in the thick of it, still not fully sure of what was good and right or bad and wrong.

But now, as she let Genya cut her newly white blond hair, Alina could feel her tangles loosen and unravel. It was a marvelous feeling. One that she was feeling more and more ever since she had broken it off with Mal.

She felt it when Tolya and Tamar invited her to live with them. She felt it when she quit working at the Brew to work at the Shu restaurant instead. She felt it when Alexei came to see her new home and insisted that she put her art back up with Tolya and Tamar’s vehement agreement. She felt it when she picked up a soft charcoal pencil for the first time in over a year and put it to paper.

“Okaaaa-aaaay!” Genya sing-songed, “Time for the big reveal!”

“You’re going to _die_ when you see yourself, Alina!” Tamar insisted.

“Is that a good thing?” Alina asked.

“ _YES._ ” Her friends said firmly in unison.

Genya placed two firm hands on Alina and spun her around to face the mirror.

It was like a completely different person was staring back at her and, for a split second, Alina couldn’t tell that it was her. Not until the reflection’s lips parted with her startled gasp.

Now that it was dry, the color made her think of starlight, delicate and bright. It was beyond platinum blonde; it was the stark white of little elderly ladies. But there was nothing old about its cut.

For as long as she could remember, Alina had kept her hair a few inches past her shoulder in a single layer. It was so thin and straight that she never tried to do anything with it besides subdue it into a ponytail or messy bun. It didn’t even take well to braiding, always slipping loose.

Now it had volume from carefully crafted layers. The shortest of them just dusted her cheekbones and the longest barely made it to her collar bones. Somehow, even though Genya had cut her hair shorter, she looked like she had more of it than ever. She guessed that she would still be able to pull most of it back into a ponytail, but she would probably have to get some bobby pins to hold her bangs back from her face when Genya wasn’t looking.

Despite the anticipated annoyance of hair in her eyes, Alina loved the way the cut framed her face, highlighting her already high cheekbones. She looked stylish, purposefully tousled and confident.

Alina grinned.

Genya and Tamar grinned back at her in the mirror.

The girls toasted to the haircut’s success and then to Genya’s prowess as beautician and then to just how hot Alina looked and then a fourth time because they were drunk and beyond needing a justification to take another shot. Genya and Alina quickly caught up to Tamar’s rice wine with their kvas.

Soon girl’s night was in full swing with a trashy movie playing in the background, an incognito browser open for Facebook/Instagram/Tumblr stalking, experimental lipstick colors, and two packs of nude playing cards (a male and female deck respectively… for fairness’s sake of course).

At one point Tolya poked his head into Tamar’s room to investigate the screeching and giggling noises only to quickly retreat at the threat of makeover. He shuffled away to the sound of three women cackling, while muttering something like “not again” under his breath.

Eventually though, the combination of alcohol and the late hour took its effects on the women. Tamar laid sprawled on her bed, blearily staring at the ceiling, with her legs up the wall in a way that would make her regret all of her life choices in the morning. Alina and Genya sat on the floor leaning against each other. They were both sloppily apologizing to each other repeatedly.

“I didn’t have-tuh be such a bitch though!” Genya insisted.

“You were just being a good friend,” Alina patted Genya’s face with her hand. “And you made me pretty, errvry-thing is furgivin’!”

Tamar cut into the slurred conversation, “Alina, you were pretty before, now you’re ir-irre-irresistible!”

The three of them giggled over the messy tumble of Tamar’s tongue, then fell into a contented silence.  But intoxication can be a pendulum, swinging from euphoria to sorrow and Alina was caught in the down swing.

In a small, sad voice – her little mushroom girl voice –  Alina asked, “Even to Aleks?”

Genya sat up straight then swayed a little as she pointed in Alina’s general direction. “He’s not worth it!” She insisted.

“Gunna get my axes and murder him,” Tamar mumbled sleepily and Alina nervously eyed a pair of antique axes on Tamar’s wall that she had previously thought were just decorations.

Genya pulled Alina into a clumsy hug and Alina started to cry a little, “You’re such a good friend. Even when I- I _lost_ your painting!”

“What painting?” Genya asked.

“That one- the one I made of you and the sun. It was for you and I just let him take it!” Alina dissolved into short little breaths, becoming dangerously close to hyperventilations until both Tamar and Genya started to rub her back while making soothing noises.

“We could always steal it back.” Genya offered once Alina was breathing normally again.

“I know a guy…” Tamar suggested.

Alina laughed wetly, “You two. You two are _perfect_.” Then collected them into a big hug. “But if we are going to steal anything, we’re going for his dogs first.”

“Puppies!” Tamar yelled and the three of them dissolved into giggles again.

Drunken plans were made, equal parts overly elaborate and wildly incomplete, that would be completely forgotten by morning. One by one the girls fell asleep on Tamar’s bed in a warm tangle of limbs. Alina was the last to go.

Just as her eyes fluttered to a close she whispered, “I thought he was worth it.”

~ ~ ~ ~

_“The sky is so big here that it makes me feel small. It’s almost claustrophobic in its expansiveness. I don’t mind it, plus I’ll be moving on in a week anyways, but I think that you would love it. Your sketchbook would be full in a day for sure. Maybe someday we’ll travel here together. Family trip? Haha_

_Love,_

_Mal”_

Alina smiled softly as she pinned the postcard of the wide Zemeni planes to the fridge with a magnet. They had both gotten a small cushion of money after they sold they sold their old house. Alina had chosen to make a sizeable dent in her student loans. Mal had chosen to take a year to explore the world. He sent her a postcard here and there to let her know that he was alive and well. The first ones she had gotten were from Fjerda, then a few from the Wandering Isle, but this was the first one she had gotten from Novyi Zem.

She had received seven post cards in total and seeing as he sent one about every two weeks he had been gone for almost four months now. Alina missed him a little bit, but not as much as she thought she would. It was nice to know that he was well without having to spend any effort of her own. He never stayed in any place long enough for her to send a return card and he hadn’t gotten an international cellphone so there was no point in trying to call him. After so much time of trying to reach out to him and hold onto him, it was frankly a relief.

Alina picked her mug of coffee up from the counter and took a step back from the fridge to get a better look at all of the cards. Each one was cluttered with beautifully bold, bright colors and she loved them all. Mal knew her well.

It was kind of sad. There was still that childish little part of her that wished she could have made it all work out. But that part went quiet when she looked at slowly growing collection of postcards. Mal was happy. Happier than he had been in a long time, happier than he had been with her, happier with every new card. His messages were always short, but Alina could tell. She also knew him well.

It was for the best, but it still hurt and Alina’s tangles were still unraveling. One day her love for Mal would be a simple again, not the bent thing it had become. Right now though, while she drank the morning’s coffee and looked at the colorful postcards, she let herself feel the sadness of a lost dream. But once she had drained the last drop, she put her mug in dishwasher and a part of her sadness with it.

One day was closer than ever.

~ ~ ~ ~

“Alina, there is a scary woman who is insisting that you serve her even though she’s sitting in my section.” Tolya said.

Alina frowned. “What does she look like?”

“I dunno. She has black hair I think?”

_Baghra?_ Alina’s heart started to speed up and her mouth went dry.

With a concerned furrow to his large brow, Tolya asked, “Are you okay? Should I tell her to leave?”

“No, no.” She waved him off. “I was just surprised is all. I’ll handle it.”

Alina exited the kitchen and walked slowly to Tolya’s side of the dining room. She tried her best not to feel like she was walking to the gallows. When she rounded the corner her eyes immediately snapped to a slightly frizzy head of black hair. However, the woman who sat with her back to Alina looked too young. She also was wearing clothes that Alina didn’t think Baghra would be caught dead in; an oversized sweater dress over leggings that tucked into weird slipper boots.

“Zoya? Saints, you look _terrible_.” Alina said without any malice. She was just truly surprised by drastic changes in appearance in front of her.

Zoya sat with slumped shoulders, clutching a large glass of ice water with a ragged straw in it. There were dark, puffy circles under her eyes and new angles to her drawn face. Her usually perfect ringlets were somehow both frizzier and less springy than usual.

Alina was reminded of her old reflection in a mirror, the one she used to avoid at all costs. It was as if they had switched places.

In the last four months of living with Tolya and Tamar, she had flourished. Gone were the constant stresses of trying to pay rent on a rundown house she couldn’t afford, her attempts to be what she thought Mal wanted her to be, and technically working for her Ex. Her sleep schedule had evened out and she moved around more during her shifts at the restaurant. She also ate better and with increased frequency. Instead of sugary cereal she had congee and fresh fruit for breakfast. She regularly ate lunch now, dinner too. Tolya and Tamar made sure of it, feeding her as many noodles and vegetables as she could possibly stomach.

For the first time since puberty, Alina had gained some weight. Some of it was even muscle too, from to all the heavy trays of dim sum and drunken shrimp she carried around. She felt better than ever and she even _breathed_ easier. The change was so drastic that Alina was pretty sure that her old house must have had a mold problem.

It wasn’t that Alina had become some great beauty, she just didn’t look so damn sickly all the time. Zoya also wasn’t ugly now, in fact she was still frustratingly gorgeous, even with whatever stress that her body obviously dealing with.

“Oh that’s real nice Starkov, yuk it up why don’t you?” Zoya snapped. Her face soured even more and she took a long sip of her ice water.

“What are you doing here, Zoya?”

“I dropped by the Brew, but Alexei said you work here now.”

“What, you missed harassing me or something?” Alina said acerbically. “Seriously though, I have _actual_ customers at table two waiting for their sweet and sour pork.”

“Like I care abou-,” Zoya started to say, but cut herself off as Tolya passed by them with a heavy plate of steamed buns. Her face paled and she took another frantic sip of her water. “Saints, it stinks in here. Can we go somewhere else? Please?”

Alina didn’t know if it was the use of the word ‘please’ or if it was because Zoya looked like she was about to hurl at any moment, but she found herself agreeing. She gave Tamar a heads up then let Zoya out the back and to the apartment above the restaurant.

“Ugh, it smells just as bad up here.” Zoya complained as she slowly sat herself down at the kitchen table. She moved worse than the old lady Alina had originally mistaken her for. “I need tea, ginger if you have it.”

Alina sighed, ran a frustrated hand through her hair and went to go turn on the electric kettle. From past experience, she found it was easier to talk to Zoya when she got her way at least a little.

Zoya, seemingly impatient with how long it was taking Alina to wait on her hand and foot, got up to look at the postcards on the fridge.

“Not very romantic, is he?” She said snidely.

“What?”

“Mal’s postcards. Pretty bland for his _true love._ ” The way she said the words made Alina think that he must have called her that in front of or to Zoya at one point. She really wished that he wouldn’t have.

“Well, that would because we aren’t engaged anymore, now wouldn’t it?”

“Oh. Since when?” Zoya’s voice was small, but Alina missed any correlating expression on her face, as she was filling a tea ball with the loose leaf mint tea- the only kind a tea snob like Tamar would let into the house, a part of her strict ‘no tea bag’ policy.

“Late January, not that it’s any of your business.”

“Oh.” Her voice was even quieter this time and Alina turned to look at her. But, seemingly bored with the postcards, Zoya was already slightly limping her way back to the table. So Alina went back to the mugs. Once she was done brewing the tea, she placed it in front of Zoya and took the seat across from her.

“Well?” She asked, expecting answers now that Zoya had her hot drink.

Zoya sniffed at the tea delicately. “It could be stronger, also I would have preferred it over ice... and with a straw.”

Alina’s temper finally snapped like a stiff rubber band. “Oh for all the ever loving- I have _never_ had to deal with anyone as insufferable, snide, nasty, pompous, and downright horrid as you, Zoya Nazyalensky. And that’s including Aleksander Morozova, who I _slept with!_ ”

_Shit, I didn’t mean to say that last part out loud._ Alina thought as her winded breathing filled the room.

Zoya stared at her calmly. “Wow, Mr. Morozova _and_ Mr. Lantsov. You sure were busy before Malyen.”

Alina was about the flip the table. She really was. But Zoya continued to speak before she could.

“I’m pregnant… and it’s Mal’s.”

All of the air whooshed out of Alina’s lungs. _Did the bastard…_

“I’m only 15 weeks along, so he didn’t cheat on you, if that’s what you’re wondering.” Zoya said primly, clearly reading her mind. “I didn’t know it at the time though. Honestly, I can’t tell if I’m relieved or disappointed that I wasn’t the mistress.”

Alina was still quiet, calculating out how many months 15 weeks was at an embarrassingly slow rate.

Zoya continued, “He wouldn’t even talk to me you know, not for the entire time you two were dating. One day we were texting every other hour and the next he just said ‘I’m with Alina now’ and stopped responding all together.”

Alina continued to sit in shock, marveling at the words coming out of Zoya’s mouth and how small she looked while saying them.

“He didn’t even tell me when he got engaged. I had to find out through Nadia when she came across that dumb article.”

For once Alina agreed with Zoya on something. Alexei teased her about ‘that dumb article’ for weeks. Now that Zoya had finally started talking though, Alina didn’t really want to bring up the irony.

“I thought that was the end it, that I’d only ever see him in passing. But then one night I was out drinking with the girls and he was drunk off his ass.” She chuckled darkly. “I guess I know why now and well… you can probably figure out what happened after that.”

Alina suddenly remembered one of their fights. She had yelled, _‘Why can’t you just believe me? I’ve never even thought of cheating on you!’_ and Mal has responded _‘Because I…’_

_Because I_ what? She wondered. Because he _had_ thought of cheating on her?

Alina knew that she should feel anger and betrayal. It should be running through her like a forest fire. But instead there was just relief.

“Why are you telling me this?”

Zoya looked away, not seeming to be able to meet Alina’s eyes. The cool light of the kitchen struck her face at a new angle, making her cheekbones even more prominent. Alina realized that the reason why Zoya must look so sick was because of the pregnancy. She had asked for ginger tea because she was nauseous. And she wasn’t limping, she was already waddling ever so slightly.

“After I found out, I couldn’t contact him. At first I thought he was ignoring me and then I thought that he had blocked me. Now I know that he wasn’t even in the same country anymore.” She sighed and it was such a sad sound that even Alina, Zoya’s number one hater, felt a tug at her heart.

“That night… he didn’t even tell me he was leaving. Hell, he wasn’t even there when I woke up. He had never done that before, I thought it was because he was cheating, but… he…”

Zoya suddenly looked up at Alina. “Do you want to know the worst part? It’s not the constant vomiting. It’s not the way that my boobs or my back hurt. It’s not the fact that this is going to extend my time at law school by _at least_ a year. It’s not even the way I look like hell frozen over.”

“No. The worst part is that I want this baby.”

“I want this baby so badly. And not just that. I want her father, but he doesn’t want me. And that scares me. It scares me so much, because I’m all alone and I’m going to be all this baby has and… and… I’m such a _bitch_.”

Zoya started to cry.

Alina panicked.

She rushed over to Zoya’s side and started to pat her back awkwardly, trying and failing to recreate the soothing motions that Tamar and Genya had calmed her down with in the past.

“You’re not a-”

“If you’re about to say I’m not a bitch, I will fucking cut you open Starkov, because you and I know it would be a damn lie.” She snapped, but the angry words were broken up with sobbing and it wasn’t all that impressive.

“Okay, you’re right. You are a bitch.”

Zoya swatted at her, but it was a half-hearted motion.

“But guess what? It doesn’t matter what you are, because it may seem like it now, but you aren’t alone. Mal is going to come back and when he does he’s going to be the best damn father ever. I can’t say he’ll want to date you, but he will be there for you and the baby.”

Zoya sniffled a little. “Really?”

“Of course. And until then I’ll be there for you.”

“ _What?_ ” Zoya said it aloud, but Alina also screamed it inside her head.

Yet, for some reason. she continued to talk with a strong conviction. “That’s right. You are carrying my niece in there and she is way more important than whatever I feel about you.”

Zoya looked at Alina like she had sprung two heads or started blasting sunlight out of her butt or something. “Why do you think it’s a girl?”

Alina blinked at her. “You said it was.”

“Did I? I guess so. I don’t actually know yet. I won’t find out for another few weeks now.”

“Do you have a preference?”

“Yeah, but it doesn’t really matter does it? I just hope it’s healthy. I mean _if_ I could actually pick I definitely wouldn’t want it to be-”

“A boy?” Alina guessed at the same time Zoya said, “A girl.”

The two of them looked at each other in surprise then started to laugh.

“The world isn’t ready for the amount of bitchiness my daughter would bring.” Zoya said with a proud smirk.

With a sly grin Alina replied, “Have you met Mal? What the world isn’t ready for is the amount of bitchiness his son would bring.”

They broke down into hysterical laughter and Alina felt like she was on a conversational rollercoaster. One minute Zoya was crying, then Alina was laying a claim to her baby, and then they were joking about its gender. After a few minutes of laughter, they managed to calm down, but that was quickly ruined when Alina uttered the phrase “bitch baby” and they dissolved again.

They continued to talk for a while and the conversation flowed surprisingly well. Maybe it was due to the fact that whenever anything became tense one of them made a jab at Mal. Once Zoya was ready to leave, Alina had all of her doctor’s appointments on her calendar and had grudgingly promised to throw her a baby shower. She had even agreed to go to Lamaze classes with her- something that Alina would severely regret once she looked up what a Lamaze class actually was.

Alina realized something as she watched Zoya’s slightly waddling figure walk away.

She didn’t just have a prospective niece or nephew, she had a sister.

It was odd. Alina had been so afraid to break up with Mal, afraid that it would mean losing the only family she had ever known. But if she hadn’t broken up with him, Zoya most likely wouldn’t be pregnant. The act of letting go had gained her two whole family members instead of losing one.

But…

Oh _Saints_.

Zoya was her sister now.

_Fuck._

Alina guessed that you really couldn’t pick your family.

But Zoya?

Really?

_Fuckity. Fuck. Fuck._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise I'm not trying to play with y'all's little hearts. I PROMISE. I just... there are too many loose ends to wrap up in one more chapter. So instead you get four... God I'm bad at planning! xD I will try my best to stick to this, because the last thing I want is for this fic to drag on instead of ending on a good note. So I promise that I will try not to play with hearts anymore... at least when it comes to the chapter count. ;)
> 
> Anyways, as always, I hope that you guys all enjoyed this. COMMENTS MAKE ME LIVE TO WRITE ANOTHER DAY, cuz I'm basic like that. (We all are though so...) If you see any typos, let me know down below!
> 
> ♡
> 
> ~Btw I _finally_ made myself a [Tumblr](https://smiling-penelope.tumblr.com/). So if you have one go find me and tell me what to do there cuz I'm a tumblr n00b.  
>  x'D


	25. If I Could

Nikolai:  
>> Allliiiiiinnnnnaaaaaaaa!  
>> Alina?  
>> aLiNA!  
>> A  l  i  n  a   A  l  i  n  a    A  l  i  n  a   A  l  i  n  a 

<< WHAT?!

>> I’m bored.  
>> Come hang out with me!

<< No.

>> Plz

<<I’m tired.

Alina looked down on the piece she had been working on. Like everything she tried to make lately, it wasn’t turning out well. The lines were all wrong, wobbly or too bold, and the colors were just dreadful, somehow dull yet garish at the same time.

She fought the urge to crumple up the page. If only because the recycle next to her was already overflowing with crumpled papers and she didn’t want to bring the top of the precarious pile tumbling to the ground. If she had been at home, there would be papers furiously flying left and right without a care, if they ever made it close to the bin. But she was at the Brew to prevent that very thing.

Alina was artistically blocked. And she was furious about it, but anger was getting her nowhere. So, at Alexei’s prompting, she had come to her old haunt to try and get some work done while he supplied her with an IV drip of coffee and as many day-old croissants as she could eat. The idea was that she wouldn’t be able to throw her usual paper-throwing tantrum in public so she would be forced to just keep working until she produced something, _anything._

It had worked in a way. She hadn’t thrown anything yet, but the telltale pile of defeat was growing next to her nonetheless. Alexei had looked over at her with concern a few times and Alina had just stared back with a glare that said “say something about my failure, I dare you.” She may not be physically throwing papers, but she still felt the inner turmoil of her artistic tantrum.

She gnawed at the eraser of her favorite sketching pencil, a terrible habit she had picked up in art school. Also not a great thing to do in public, but Alina was beyond caring. She took a sip of her impossibly large cup of bitter coffee and winced. Her hands were already shaking with frustration and the added caffeine wasn’t helping.

She jumped at the buzz of her phone as Nikolai responded.

>> Too tired to chill with your BFF and watch Netflix on his gloriously soft couch?

<< Yes.  
<< Also, you aren’t my BFF Nikolai. Genya is.

>> I’ll fight her for it.

<< Go ahead. See how that works out for you.

>> (´◕︵◕`)

Alina felt a little pang of guilt at the sad face of the little emoji Nikolai sent her. She could vividly picture his own face making that expression, an expression of her own creation.

Alina had been avoiding Nikolai, to the point where even _she_ couldn’t deny it anymore and Alina was nothing if not a master of lying to herself.

It wasn’t that she didn’t want to see him, she really did. It was just… Ever since she broke things off with Mal, things had shifted. Ironically, she saw Nikolai even less now that she was single than when she was engaged and having to hide the fact that it was Nikolai she was hanging out with.

He hadn’t said anything, hadn’t done anything, to cause the shift, but Alina felt it all the same. They had never really discussed what had happened between them before everything fell apart. And once they were friends again, Alina was engaged, and it seemed like a pointlessly awkward topic to bring up anyways.

But now the topic wasn’t pointless anymore, and that scared her, enough to make her want to avoid her friend.

Alina’s thumbs hovered over her phone screen as she debated what to say to him. She sat there for a few minutes not coming up with anything that could be said over text. It was just too big of an elephant in the room for them to address with a keypad alone.

While she hesitated Nikolai sent another response.

>> I have fancy chocolates.

<< Not worth it.

Alina couldn’t help it. It was a knee jerk reaction.

>> They are shaped like miniature coffee cups!  
>> With itty bitty handles and everything!

If anyone was watching her, Alina was pretty sure that they would be laughing at the pained expression on her face. She snuck a glance at Alexei who was, thankfully, too consumed by his flirtations with a customer.

She knew she should hang out with Nikolai, it had been too long. And besides she _wanted_ to hang out with Nikolai. Alina missed him and she was the only one standing in the way of their friendship.

Also, the only thing better than chocolate was fancy chocolate.

<< Okay fine.  
<< Only if you pick me up and I get final say on what we watch.

>> (๑˃̵ᴗ˂)و

Alina’s stomach dropped at the sight of about eighty random emojis that followed. She hoped that amount of enthusiasm was normal for just friends.

~ ~ ~ ~

Nikolai lived in a surprisingly small apartment in the Fjerdan district. It was surprising both because Alina figured that growing up rich would mean he wouldn’t even be able to comprehend not having ballrooms for dining rooms or theaters for living rooms. But also because for such a little space the cost was ridiculous. Sure, every appliance and surface was new and modern and the view was even more breath taking than others Alina had seen before, but still. Tiny.

It was a lofted apartment with the bedroom nestled above the kitchen and dining room, within view of the living room. Even from her far corner of the couch she could see the crumpled sheets of an unmade bed.

Not that Alina was thinking about beds or anything.

But it was right there.

“Alina?”

“Huh? What?” She jerked her head back to Nikolai from the completely random, fixed spot in the distance she had been staring at.

“I was just asking which you preferred. Timeless classic and my heart’s song – Mean Girls or guilty pleasure slash dumpster fire – Pirates of the Caribbean.” He toggled back and forth between the two options rapidly as he stared down Alina intensely.

She scrunched up her face, “Eww, neither.”

He gasped. “Unfriended!”

Alina rolled her eyes and grabbed the controller from him. She scrolled through a few options. “How about this one?”

“Ugh, Big Eyes? Of course you would pick that one.” He said with a mixture of both fondness and mild disgust.

“It’s a good movie about the struggles of a female artist!”

“Yeah, and it’s also a downer.”

Alina gave a sigh of frustration. They had been going back and forth on what to watch for about a half hour. She really wished that they could just pick something and go with it by this point. Alina had already eaten her way through the box of fancy chocolates. And while admittedly both adorable and tasty, they had given her a stomach ache which didn’t help her already sour disposition.

“I thought that we agreed that I get final say.” She asked him.

“Yeah final say. I give you options to pick from.” He said with a calm smirk that made Alina want to hit him.

“Fine.” She huffed. “Other than Mean Girls or Pirates of the Caribbean, what do you want to watch?”

He didn’t say anything and Instead of leaning over to grab the controller back from Alina, he shifted to the middle of the sofa. He plucked the controller from her hands.

“To be honest, I don’t really want to watch anything right now.” He said casually, but there was suddenly a charge to the air.

Alina laughed uncertainly. “Have you ever been honest a day in your life?” She tried to tease him to cover the nervousness in her voice.

She was sure it didn’t work.

“When it counts.” He placed the controller on the sleek glass coffee table with that same falsely light tone.

Nikolai leaned back into the plush couch and his posture was suddenly hard to read. He was half angled towards Alina, his knees almost touch hers, but his upper half was now firmly angled away. Alina unconsciously leaned forward, her breath was bated on his words.

“You’ve been avoiding me.” His face was a casual mask.

Alina reached her hand up to fiddle with a strand of her hair, but it was shorter now and her hand fell back into her lap fruitlessly.

“Yes.” She admitted.

The casual mask slipped a little as Nikolai furrowed his brow. “Why?”

Alina looked away.

His shoulders lifted from the couch as he leaned in to tilt Alina’s face towards him.

“It’s been months since we last hung out. You’ve ignored my texts, avoided me when I came over to hang out with Tolya and Tamar, and you practically walked backwards out of the Brew the other day when you saw I was checking up on that location.”

_Shit._ She had really hoped that he hadn’t seen that. She had just wanted to drop by to sneak a day old croissant from Alexei. She had seen Nikolai’s back and bolted, but apparently not before he saw her.

“Did I do something wrong? Because if I did, I would like the chance to formally apologize. And those planes that write stuff out in the sky? They book pretty far out. I’m going to need to know what I did if I’m going to get moving on that.” He flashed her his signature grin, but it didn’t reach his eyes.

Alina couldn’t bring herself to smile back. “I’m sorry.” Was all she said.

“You still haven’t said why.” His eyes were wide with concern, hurt, and another emotion that Alina really wished she didn’t see there.

His hand was warm and large against her face. It was comforting and she couldn’t help but close her eyes and lean into it little. If only they could stay here, suspended in this tenuous moment before she inevitably ruined things.

“I want to kiss you.” He said.

Her eyes fluttered back open in shock, she didn’t think before she spoke. “You already kissed me.”

“I want to kiss you again.” He admitted and there was an edge of desperation to his voice. A desperation so uncharacteristic of him that it hurt.

They were both leaning in now, close enough to feel the air move between them. Alina wasn’t sure which one of them moved first, or if they both moved at the same time, but suddenly their lips were touching.

They were two waves crashing against each other, surging forward to meet then sinking into each other. Alina was quickly pinned to the couch, but Nikolai was dragged down just as fast.

He caught her lower lip with a nip of his teeth and Alina swiped her tongue along his upper lip. They both groaned against each other.

And then he was everywhere at once; his knee rested between her legs, one arm was wrapped solidly around her waist, pulling her closer, the other tangled deep into her hair. It was too much.

It wasn’t enough.

Alina ran a shaking hand under Nikolai’s shirt, along the taught muscles of his abdomen. She pressed her fingernails into him softly, expecting a moan of appreciation or a deepening of the kiss. Instead she received a sad little sigh.

“Alina stop.”

She pressed herself against him, grinding her body on his until she got the moan that she was looking for. But as soon as she got it, he was pulling away from her.

His voice was firm, but not unkind. “Alina, you’re shaking, I need you to stop.”

She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to reach for him again. She caught only air.

Alina wanted to scream in frustration. Why did everything have to be so difficult? Couldn’t she just have this? Even if maybe they didn’t feel the same way, weren’t on the same page, couldn’t she still just have this before everything came crashing down?

Nikolai was holding himself away from her as if it physically hurt, and maybe it did. So Alina eased herself out from underneath him, back to her end of the sofa. She pulled her knees to her chest and wrapped her arms around them protectively.

“I thought you said that you wanted to kiss me.” Her cheeks burned with the sting of embarrassment.

He ran a nervous hand through his hair.

“Not like this. You’re shaking.”

“News flash Nikolai, people shake and it’s not always a bad thing. Besides I drank a galleon of espresso before I came over.” _Now can we get back to the kissing?_ She wanted to add. Kissing meant no talking. And right now talking seemed like the worst thing they could be doing.

He sighed. “It’s not just that. When I kiss you it’s like you aren’t fully there.”

Alina puffed up, inflated by that stinging embarrassment. “What more do you want from me?”

He shrugged and she deflated.

“Well this is all I have to give.”

Nikolai’s intense hazel eyes met her. “That’s exactly what I was afraid of.”

She could feel the relationship that they had both worked to fix, start to come apart at the seams.

Again Alina wondered why it all had to be so difficult.

Genya had David. Polite, absentmindedly sweet, David who was funnier and wittier than he let on to anyone else. Apparently while he seemed absorbed in his macarons and tiered cakes he heard a lot of things, and had even more opinions on them. Genya brought that side of him out, even in front of Alina on occasions. Ever since that night at the gallery they had been attached at the hip. It was almost a year and a half now that they had been dating and there were endlessly cloying discussions about them moving in together and what that would mean.

On the other end of the spectrum there was Alexei with his endless stories of flings and one-night stands. He didn’t want to be tied down right now. He had his friends, his day job, and a side job of starting up an internet design company. He had always been much better at digital art in school, much to Alina’s annoyance. Alexei had a sea of opportunities in front of him and he was more than happy to take a casual swim in it.

Even Zoya had her somebody. Mal would come back eventually and there wasn’t a doubt in Alina’s mind that he wouldn’t want to try again with her. Alina hadn’t voiced that to Zoya, just in case, but she knew Mal pretty well and there was something about the raven-haired beauty that always had him gravitating back to her. The addition of child into the mix, an assured promise of family, would only glue them closer together.

“Alina? What are you thinking about?” Nikolai’s soft voice jolted her from her thoughts.

She sighed. “It never all pans out does it? It doesn’t matter how hard you try to make everything work, it just never fully does.”

He gave a bitter little laugh. “No. It really doesn’t.”

They stared at each other, awkward in their silence.

“When you broke things off with Mal, I hoped…” He trailed off.

“I know.” She replied. Nikolai wanted it, wanted her. He didn’t say it, but Alina knew it anyways, because she had felt the same way about Mal once.

“If I could…” She started.

“I know.” He cut her off with a gentle smile.

“No, I don’t think you do though.” Alina said firmly. “You deserve more than what I have to give you. And you’re right, when it comes to you I’m not fully there. I want to be; it would make everything so much easier.”

“Third time’s the charm?” He cut in.

“Something like that.” She gave a weak laugh before continuing on. “But that isn’t the case and I can’t spend any more time trying to mold myself for anybody else. I spent so much time and energy trying to be what Mal wanted and needed, that I didn’t have anything left for myself. I can’t do that again, to me or to you. It wouldn’t be fair.”

_Please_ , she prayed to nobody in particular, _please don’t let this break us._ Alina was tired of losing friends.

“I wouldn’t want you to. It was bad enough watching you do it the first time.” He admitted.

And in that moment, Alina wanted nothing more than to have enough for Nikolai. She wanted to round out to be the person they both would need for a romantic relationship to work. Because Nikolai was so good. He was funny and sweet, kind and considerate, and _Saints_ he was handsome.

But just like before, just like with Mal, it didn’t matter what she wanted, he wasn’t the one for her.

Kissing Mal had felt like coming home. He was the embodiment of kicking off her shoes after a particularly long and annoying day then sinking deeply into the couch. And at first that had seemed perfect, at least until she realized the house that she came home to was rotting from the inside out. It was a home that she had never really belonged to from the start. Alina had felt like she had to work so hard, too hard, to deserve a lumpy couch that she could never quite get comfortable on.

So Mal had felt like coming home, but to the wrong one.

Kissing Nikolai had felt like an adventure. His lips tasted like the wind on her face as they sailed through the night on his motorcycle. His grip was the feeling of being pulled into a strange and new dance. When Alina had pressed up against him she had tasted a kind of reckless freedom. It had been intoxicating when she felt so trapped in her own life. Nikolai was the motorcycle ride, the trial and error of cooking, the experience of something new and exciting.

But that was fleeting for Alina, and she knew better now than to chase after it.

Nikolai sighed forcefully and flopped back into the couch. “It’s because I’m too devastatingly handsome, isn’t it? It’s overwhelming, I know.”

Alina was silent for a long disbelieving moment. It didn’t have to end here, if they could joke about this, like so much else, there had to be hope for them.

Alina laughed some of the tension away from the room. She could feel it leaching away from herself and could see it leave Nikolai’s tense frame.  “Yes that’s exactly it! I don’t know how you can look in the mirror every day and not pass out from your sheer beauty.”

He ran a hand over his face. “It’s a heavy burden, but it’s mine to bear.”

There was still an air of unspoken sadness and longing in the room, but they tried their best to ignore it. Nikolai put on Mean Girls and Alina didn’t fight him on it. They were slower to laugh and quieter than usual, but it was better than nothing at all. When the movie ended, the tension returned, but not with the knifes edge it had before.

Alina found the longest strand of her hair and toyed with it awkwardly.

“I like your hair like that.” Nikolai offered.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. It makes you look as confident as you should feel.”

Alina looked at him trying to work out his words, but he didn’t elaborate.

Instead he suddenly asked her, “Do you still love him?”

“No,” Alina said honestly, because she didn’t love Mal anymore, at least not like that.

Nikolai looked at her dubiously, but didn’t press her on it.

“I just want you to be happy.” He said and Alina had no doubt in her mind that he meant it, because it was what she wanted for him as well.

It wouldn’t be until much later that she would wonder if it was actually Mal he been asking her if she still loved.

~ ~ ~ ~

Kissing Aleksander had felt as inevitable as breathing. There was no action of coming home, because she existed in a continual state of belonging. He was exciting, but he wasn’t a momentary thrill. He was a craving, an ache, a need. He made her want with one hand then satisfied with the next.

Aleks filled the cracks of her, smoothed out the rough edges, and made her shine.

Then he had shattered her.

~ ~ ~ ~

Alina was back on Tinder and it wasn’t just Alexei who had bullied her into it this time. Genya, Tamar, Tolya, and even Nikolai and David had as well. One night they commandeered her phone while she went to the restroom and set up the app on her phone.

When she had first gotten the phone, she didn’t have any reason to reinstall the app. Alina _still_ didn’t think she had any reason, but it was hard to say no when there were five sets of puppy-dog eyes staring at you- six if you counted David’s quick glance up from the book he was reading. (Reading at a pub, really. Alina sometimes had no idea what Genya saw in him. But that was neither here nor there.)

They had picked good pictures too. Genya had volunteered a picture she took of Alina right after the big makeover reveal, looking confident and on top of the world. Tolya had a slightly silly one of her struggling to use chopsticks. And finally, almost as if he was telling her that he was okay, Nikolai offered up a picture of her posing next to his motorcycle while laughing at the camera. To round everything off, Alexei and Tamar had written the bio and it wasn’t completely cringey either.

Alina got more messages than ever before and on her newer phone the app was actually useable. The pictures didn’t take forever to load, the pages didn’t suddenly freeze, and when she swiped right it actually swiped to the right instead of glitching to the left. She found herself quickly addicted. She even added some photos of her own and edited the bio.

There was something energizing about people being interested in her and asking her questions about her pictures or hobbies. So she chatted with more people, but at the same time she practiced more caution. No more last minute, almost blind dates at bars she would never go to on her own. Instead she built up repertoires and went to places that actually interested her.

It was casual and fun. Not always comfortable, especially at certain points, but she was pleased with the endeavor overall. She never took anything further than kissing though, something that she tried not to think about too hard.

The best part was that she was meeting new people all the time. People who didn’t know anything about her and her history. It wasn’t quite like she was a completely new canvas, but more like there was more canvas to her. She was able to show those new sections first before deciding if she wanted to share the murkier patches of paint on her soul.

And if she found somebody she already knew and didn’t want to interact with in that way (and she never did) then she could just swipe them left and away.

Well, until she came across the person who had the biggest hand in muddying the paint of her.

Alina felt an overwhelming rush of anger hit her like a hot blast of air from an open oven door. Unconsciously she started to clench her jaw, grating tooth against tooth painfully. Her vision narrowed, darkening around the corners, so that the only thing she saw was his face.

Aleksander Morozova stared back at her with confident smirk. His hair was mussed and cheeks slightly pinked from the exercise he had obviously been doing right before he took the selfie. Alina simultaneously wanted to kiss along his jaw to taste the salt on his skin and to strangle him until his delicate flush turned breathlessly red.

The long crack of her phone’s screen ran across his face and for some reason that made everything worse.

She had gotten so used to the crack, hardly even noticing it anymore. It had become background noise for her and her mind automatically tuned it out. It was her nose or a pair of sunglasses resting upon it.

Alina just didn’t see it, didn’t think to see it.

But now, as it stretched from his slightly exposed left collar bone, cut across his lips, flared at his quirked right eyebrow, and ended just above his mussed hair, it was all Alina could see.

Alina’s breath was held hostage in her ribcage. It pressed painful against her sternum, an instinctive reflex to remind her that she needed to breathe. She didn’t.

Instead she scrolled to the next picture, just to get away from the captivating sharpness of his eyes. It was a mistake. A picture of Volcra and Vo’ya popped up, they were splayed across his lap as he sat cross legged on his couch.

The deep motherly part of her reacted before she could think to squash it down. _My babies_ , she thought.

But not anymore.

She scrolled again. He leaned against a familiar doorway, the entrance to his gallery. Alina squinted. There was something hanging in the window next to him.

A slow realization crawled over her. For a moment it took the edge off of her anger, an empty sorrow that leached it away.

He wasn’t showing her art anymore. She wasn’t in his life anymore.

But she still _wanted_ to be. She wanted his sweaty kisses, she wanted to pet his dogs, and- _sickeningly_ \- she wanted her art to still hang in his gallery. At the core of her sadness was a possessiveness. _This should be mine._

As she scrolled through the pictures on his profile she couldn’t help but insert herself into them. _I should have been there. I_ could _have been there._ She saw her fingers next to his tangled in black fur. She saw herself standing next to him in front a gallery that should be featuring _their_ art.

The anger returned in full force, because she knew that she shouldn’t still want these things. She should be over this by now.

But she wasn’t.

There was a crack, deep and ugly, running through her life, and not the one on her phone. For months she had been ignoring it, seeing past it, and pushing it down. But she couldn’t anymore.

Her hands shook, but her movement was purposeful.

She swiped right.

.

.

.

They matched.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You know the drill. Give me my lifeblood - your comments, your kudos, your tears- and in return the next chapter will most likely, probably get written faster! ;) I mean, I'll write it either way, but you guys really help! ♡
> 
> lol, anyways, I hope that you liked this chapter and are having a nice day! Oh and if you see a typo, feel free to let me know!
> 
> I have a [tumblr](https://smiling-penelope.tumblr.com/) now, so if you have one too, we should hang out! ♡


	26. Control.

Aleksander might have come across her profile and initiated the first swipe, but Alina was going to be damned if she let him have the first word.

>> When and where?

Her reckless fingers messaged him before she could fully process her own words. It wasn’t until she hit send that she realized she had already passed him the reigns. She wanted to kick herself. Why hadn’t she just told him to go to hell before blocking him?

Maybe she should just delete her Tinder all together, pretend like she had never even had one to begin with. Yes, that was the best option. Alina opened up the little help icon, but right before she could click on the section labeled ‘Account help’ a message notification opened up.

<< So eager to see me again?  
<< I have to admit; this isn’t the reaction I was expecting.

A whole host of responses popped into Alina’s head.

_Fuck you._

_You broke my heart._

_I want my art back._

_And the dogs too while you are at it._

_Only douches use semicolons._

_No, seriously. Fuck you._

>> What reaction were you expecting then?

Alina double checked the message over before she sent it. It was good, not revealing or admitting anything while still asking for more information. A little wave of pride washed over her. She could do this.

Although she wasn’t exactly sure what _this_ was. The wave receded back into a deep ocean of doubt.

What _was_ she doing?

<< I want to talk.

He ignored her question, giving her the time and location that she had first asked for. It drove her crazy. But then again, she hadn’t answered his question either.

She was tempted to try and change the time or outright refuse him. She didn’t.

Alina knew that she was forging a path down a slippery slope. She knew that there was nothing good for her at the bottom of that slope either. It would be better if she just stopped now.

She didn’t.

She was tired of treading carefully. So she forged ahead, not caring that she could trip at any moment, not realizing that there could be a middle ground between timid caution and reckless abandon.

~ ~ ~ ~

>> I need your help.

Alina texted Genya about two seconds after she agreed to meet with Aleksander. Her heart was pounding in her chest and she had to backspace to correct the numerous mistakes that her shaking hands made.

<< With what? Are you okay?

>> Yeah.  
>> No.  
>> I’m really not sure.

Alina’s phone lit up and buzzed in her hand as Genya called her. She stared at it numbly and didn’t pick until a ring before it would have gone to voicemail.

“Alina? What’s going on?” Genya’s voice was already tinged with concern.

“I’m okay, I just… I need you to do something for me.”

“Sure, anything. What do you need?”

Alina took a deep steading breath. “I need you to make me look good enough to make a grown man cry.”

There was silence on the other end of the line, so Alina continued on fiercely. “I want him to weep at what he can’t have.”

Genya’s voice was quiet, hesitant, “Is this about Morozova?”

“Yes.”

Another long silence, long enough for Alina to worry that the call had dropped or that Genya was about to pop out from behind her to knock some sense into her.

“I’ll do it,” she finally said. “But Alina?”

“Yeah?”

“He’s not worth it.”

Alina pursed her lips. “That’s exactly what I’m going to show him.”

~ ~ ~ ~

For once in her life Alina just let Genya do whatever she wanted to her appearance. Her only request was to not look desperate.

“Alina, darling. The only one who is going to look desperate is him when he sees you walk through the door.” Genya had said seriously through a mouth full of bobby pins.

Alina had expected Genya to shove her into a sky-high heels and an even higher skirt. She thought her friend would give her brows sharper than knifes and lipstick the color of fresh blood.

But when she looked in the mirror at the final product, Alina had to do a double take. Her makeup was modest and understated, only supporting what was already there. Her attire surprisingly simple and comfortable, tight black jeans paired with a loose fitting white crop top that read ‘Mood.’ in bold lettering.

Alina reached a tentative hand to her artfully disheveled hair before looking at her friend in confused disbelief. This was the girl who was always begging Alina to wear more skirts, dresses, and heels. She threatened her on a daily basis with mascara and lipstick.

But now she had Alina in a slightly scuffed pair of white sneakers?

“You have to look effortless.” Genya explained. “You want him to weep with what he can’t have, right? Well then. He can have his fantasies, you dressed to the nines ready to crush hearts under your heel. But he can’t have you.”

Genya gave Alina a hug from behind so that they were both looking in the mirror as she spoke.

“Alina, you are beautiful just the way you are. And who you are prefers simple clothing and understatement. If you show up looking like you are ready to strut a runway, he’ll think that you look that way for him. But this-” she gestured up the length of Alina’s reflection. “This is you looking your best for you. Comfort and confidence in your own skin without any concern for what others think of you is the sexiest thing of all.”

Alina looked at her reflection in the mirror again. She remembered when she used picture the faces of all the women Mal had brought home think of how she paled in comparison to them. She remembered wishing for blue eyes and toying with the idea of dying her hair black.

Now Alina saw only herself. She saw her perceived flaws, her treasured strengths, and the mundane features in between.

_I like your hair like that. It makes you look as confident as you should feel._

Alina finally looked in a mirror and saw herself.

And she looked _good_.

Alina grinned a wide grin, matched only by the one on Genya’s face next to hers in the mirror.

“Morozova is going to need a hanky when I’m done with him.”

“Are you kidding me? He’s going to need a damn life raft to survive the flood of tears.”

~ ~ ~ ~

Alina checked and double checked the address that Aleksander had given her. She even pulled up the maps app on her phone. Everything seemed to say that she was in the right place, but the abandoned shop in front of her suggested otherwise.

Was he just messing with her? Aleksander didn’t do things like give out the wrong address. At least, not on accident. So what was he playing at?

The windows of the place were covered in patchy, faded newspaper. She peered through a hole that a peeling newspaper made, but she couldn’t make out the interior. If it had been any other Tinder date, Alina would have been long gone. This was some serial killer level shit and she did not appreciate it.

“Alina.” A familiar voice sounded from behind her.

She closed her eyes for a brief moment as she tried to forcibly wrestle down the butterflies in her stomach. She would not let herself be caught up in his magnetism. She refused.

Alina turned around.

He was handsomer than his Tinder profile, he was handsomer than her memories. She had hoped that he had somehow enhanced his profile pictures or that her mind had hyped his appearance in her memories. Alina had wanted to look at him and wonder what she could have ever seen in him.

Instead she wondered how she could have ever let him go.

She swallowed even though her mouth was dry.

“Aleksander.” She returned in greeting, hating how right his name felt on her tongue. 

“You look good.”

Alina knew that the proper response would be some variation on ‘you too,’ but all she could bring herself to do was nod.

“I like the hair.”

“It wasn’t for you.”

_Crap._

And then his damned eyebrows, he raised one ever so slightly and Alina was sure that her face had to be beet red. She wanted to burrow into the earth so she could curl up and die.

“Whatever.” She said quickly before he could call her out on her sheer idiocy. “What do you want? You said you wanted to talk, so talk.”

“Let’s go inside first. It will be warmer.”

Alina looked around in confusion. “Go in where?”

He gestured to the abandoned storefront.

“Um. What?”

He chuckled, warm and low, and Alina’s body heated up. With embarrassment. With desire. With embarrassment at her desire.

“Let me show you.” Aleksander walked to the front door of the shop and unlocked it. He opened the door and gestured her to enter.

The rational part of Alina’s mind was screaming at her. It warned her not to go through the dusky door way. It implored her not to do ask Aleksander asked. It begged her to walk away now and never look back.

Alina entered the storefront.

Once her eyes adjusted to the dark interior she realized that it wasn’t a store at all, it was a café. Or at least, what used to be a café. Judging from the dust, that was a long time ago.

“I own this place.” He spoke as he switched on a light, startling Alina a little bit.

“Why?”

“I’m going to renovate it, breathe new life into it. And then I’m going to run it my way.” He paused, seeming to consider his next words. “I resigned from the brew.”

“I know.” Alina said coolly, “Nikolai told me.”

She watched his face closely, looking for some kind of reaction. For a brief moment she was rewarded with a flash of agitation, a slight clench of his jaw. But then his face smoothed back out. He was unflappable and it was infuriating.

“Yes, well. What do you think?”

“Of what?”

“The space.”

Alina took in her surrounding again. There was murky light coming in from the windows despite their newspaper coverings and she guessed that it would be nice and bright if the paper was removed. The lay out was good too. Open, but with low dividing walls creating lots of smaller spaces, perfect for settling into. It was dilapidated, but nothing money couldn’t fix and Alina knew that money wouldn’t be a problem.

“Why are you asking me?”

“Indulge me.” Aleksander said softly and Alina wanted to hit him. Hadn’t he gotten his way enough? But instead of the violence her fingers ached to inflict on him, she gave her thoughts about the place instead.

She couldn’t help her curiosity. She wanted to see where he was going with this.

“Very good.” He said.

Alina hated the little thrill that ran through her at his satisfaction.

He took a few steps towards the café’s counter where an antique espresso machine sat. He ran a finger along the copper surface, releasing a little cloud of dust.

“I’m releasing you from your contract.” He said the words so calmly that Alina had to run them through her head a second time before she realized the significance of them.

She let out a shaky breath. “Why?”

“There is nothing more to gain from it.”

Alina felt like she had been punched in the stomach. Of course. This was Morozova. He was all calculation and no kindness. He would never release her from the contract for her sake alone.

“Besides,” he continued on, “I have something much bigger planned.”

“I don’t care.”

Oh, but she did.

“You can leave anytime that you want.” He pointed out coolly.

She didn’t move.

“This space,” He gestured to area around them, “it has so much potential and not just for a coffee shop. I bought out the space next door. I want to expand into it, use it as an area for another gallery, and the space above it for a studio.”

“You have a studio and a gallery already. You’d have plenty of coffee shops too if you hadn’t betrayed your own company.” She said with as much venom as she could muster. She did it for that brief flash of agitation he was prone to showing before closing his face up completely. But it never came and she was left feeling more frustrated than ever.

“This will be different, less corporate and more mine. The brew was never a good fit for me, I needed more from it than it could offer me.”

Alina felt pinned by his gaze, feeling like he was trying to communicate some underlying meaning that she just wasn’t getting.

She glared back. “I can understand that feeling.”

“Yes, I suppose you could.”

There was tension permeating everything, Aleksander, Alina, the air and space between them. She could feel it as a physical weight in her lungs trapping the air inside of her. It crawled and squirmed under her skin like an itch that she couldn’t scratch out.

Aleksander shifted his weight from one foot to the other and the tension seemed to melt away from his frame. She didn’t know if it had actually passed from him or if he was putting up a very good act, but either way he made his control look effortless.

“This is going to be a fantastic opportunity, one that I want to extend to you as well.”

Alina laughed, harsh and grating. “What makes you think that I would ever work with you again. After what you did?”

“Because you want to. I can see it in your eyes. I can hear it in the hesitation of your voice.”

“No.”

“Alina,” His tone was soft and understanding. “Why are you here then?”

“To get my art back.” She replied flatly.

“There are easier ways to do that. You’ve had over a year to figure that out, yet you haven’t. Not until now. So, why are you here?” He spoke each word like it was its own sentence, pausing after every one.

Alina didn’t say anything, couldn’t say anything, because her throat was constricting in on itself.

He smiled at her smugly. “Just like I thought.”

Then with a purposefully casual motion, he rested his hand on the antique espresso machine letting his long fingers splay over its curved surface. “I guess what I’m asking is… would you give me another _shot_?”

It was insulting. It was not what he deserved.

It was everything Alina wanted.

It was the opposite as well.

All the time that they had been talking, Alina had been fighting an ugly urge inside of herself. She wanted to hit him, to hurt him. Alina wanted to make him physically feel all of the pain he had inflicted upon her soul. However, she hadn’t acted on that urge, because that wasn’t what rational people did. But Aleksander Morozova pushed her beyond rationality.

She advanced on him, faster than she had ever moved before. In the back of her mind she registered the moment his smirk turned into alarm, and cataloged it for a later date. That little spark of fear felt so good to her. Too good.

Alina wanted to be thunder and lightning, a force of nature powerful enough to make Aleksander cower in his boots and look for immediate cover.

She brought her lips crashing down on his and the force of it snapped his head back a little. She was all teeth and pressure and anger.

It only took Aleksander a second to process what she was doing and react, but Alina gloried in that singular moment where she knew what was happening and he didn’t. She loved the feeling under her crushing fingertips.

Control.

For once in their relationship she felt like she had complete control of the situation. Not shared. Not partial. Not none. All of it.

Alina had him pinned against the counter, but Aleksander made no move to retaliate. His lips were soft and pliable against her intensity and his hands cupped her waist lightly.

He was all gentle tenderness where she was relentless aggression.

She used her teeth as a brutal weapon, biting down hard on Aleksander’s lower lip before trailing sharp nips along his jaw and down his neck. Her hands were fisted in his hair, pulling hard enough to make him growl under his breath.

Yet he was still a placid lake where she was raging tsunami.  His fingers fluttered against her skin a little, dancing along the sliver of skin between her crop-top and tight jeans, as he pulled her closer into him.

It sent a shiver down her spine.

No. That wasn’t allowed. He wasn’t going to take back any of her control, she wouldn’t let him.

Alina untangled her fingers from his hair and pushed him harder into the counter. Her nails weren’t long, she always kept them at a practical shortness, but they were claws against his skin nonetheless. She dug them into his chest.

She figured that if she couldn’t leave marks on his heart like had hers, then she would mark his flesh. She knew that she was being petty, immature in her actions, cruel even, but she _didn’t care_.

Aleksander’s hand wrapped loosely around her wrists, but he made no move to pull her away. She could see the way he winced under the pressure of her hands, but still, _still_ , he didn’t react. So Alina gave up on that tact and lunged in again.

This time she didn’t just use her mouth to bite, but to suck on his skin as well. To her dismay he moaned when attacked the long line of his neck. Her body was flush against his and she could feel how much he wanted her.

_You aren’t supposed to like it. Fight back!_ She screamed in her mind.

This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. Not that Alina knew what she wanted to happen, but it wasn’t this. She came crashing down from the transient of high of a perceived control. Aleksander may have been pinned against the counter, but Alina felt like she was the one in a cage.

Desperate, angry, and heartbroken, she pulled away from him. She made just enough space so that she could draw her hand back in the air. Her goal was to slap him across his pretty, lying face.

He caught her wrist before it came anywhere close to hitting him. This time his grip was firm and unrelenting.

“No.” He said sternly. His eyes were dark with desire, but his bruised lips were set in a grim line. “No more.”

Alina raised her other hand. He caught that one too.

She struggled against him, feeling like a butterfly pinned to a mounting board.

“Shh,” Aleksander shushed her as he transferred her wrists to one of his large hands and pulled her in close with the other. She resisted him a little, but it was halfhearted and she gave in easily. Once it was clear that she wasn’t going to hit him again, Aleksander let go of her wrists to wrap her into a full embrace.

Alina’s face was wet with tears that she didn’t remember shedding. She still wanted to rage against Aleksander, but she was tired. So tired.

She was a-year-and-a-half-of-pretending-like-she-hadn’t-been-effected-by-this tired.

Her body sagged against his as she gave herself over to her need for comfort. His arms were warm and reassuring around her. Alina closed her eyes and for a moment she let herself pretend.

For the first time in a long time, Alina thought not of the man Aleksander had turned out to be, but of the man she had thought he was. She thought of his quiet, yet undeniable presence in a room. The way he commanded attention without saying a single word. She thought of the way he trained his dogs with endless amounts of patience and kindness, never yelling nor striking them. She thought of how smart he was, too smart for his own good. The way his steely eyes glinted during conversations and his sharp tongue drew pretty pictures.

She also thought of his flaws. His awkwardness in certain social settings, the way he ghosted out of conversations and situations. She thought of how he sometimes treated people like they were dumb because they didn’t see things just his way or annoyed him. Images of text messages left unanswered, or responded to brusquely, came to mind, next to the them the assumptions that he would make about her wants and needs.

Alina recalled every possessive, controlling thing he had done and how hard it had been to get an apology out of him for those. While at the same time the apologies had seemed so sincere once they were finally obtained. When Alina was with him she had felt heard. Sometimes she had to raise her voice, an eyebrow, or a fuss, but at the end of the day Alina had always felt like her opinions mattered to him.

She thought of the superficial things she had liked about him. The handsome lines of his face, the curve of his graceful fingers, the strong arches of his body. She had liked the way his lips moved around his words and on her skin. He was a good cook, listened to odd music, and never seemed to forget where he put his keys. She liked the way he dressed, the way he walked like he owned the world and the way his fingers danced when he gesticulated about art.

She liked the way he retaliated to her puns with even worse ones.

‘Give me another _shot_ ’ indeed.

Alina thought of all of these things and more, from the insignificant to the pivotal. She rolled her memories around like a child rolls a ball in the snow to create a large, lopsided sphere for the base of their snowman. She let herself think about Aleksander Morozova like she had never before, even before the betrayal.

She had been in love with him, had never really stopped loving him. Her descent into it had been gradual and rapid all at once, a whirlwind of absolute certainty. It was so obvious to her that she wanted to wring her own neck. But the person who she loved had never really existed, or at least, she couldn’t be certain how much the person she loved had just been a manipulative act.

Aleksander kissed her forehead, bringing her swirling thoughts back to attention.

“It will be different this time. I want it to be different.” He whispered into her hair.

Was it an act? Was the pitch and volume of his voice perfectly calibrated to make her believe him? Alina realized that she could never know for sure.

There was only one person in the room who she could trust.

Herself.

And it was about time that she started to do just that. She pushed away from him. “I don’t care what you want.”

“I want you.”

They both went very still.

_I want you too._ The words hovered on the edge of her lips. Alina wanted him desperately, wanted his mouth on every square inch of her skin. She ached for the satisfying fullness that she knew he could give her if she just let him.

She wanted her freedom more.

“You had me once, Aleksander.” Alina said, her voice only a breath above a whisper. “You had me, but it wasn’t enough for you. So you reached for more without my permission. No- I don’t care _what_ I signed, you stole from me and you know it.”

He took a step towards her, but she took a step back.

“You can’t just have me back because you’ve decided that you have more to gain by breaking the first contract and offering me another one. I don’t even know how much of this is you.” She gestured at him, taking note of the furrow between his brows. “I don’t know you, I don’t think that I ever did.”

“I have never lied to you.” He insisted fiercely.

“I didn’t say that you did.” Alina said sadly. “But if I know anything, the biggest lies we tell to others are the ones we tell to ourselves.”

He took another step towards her, this time reaching for her hand. She let him and he rubed his thumb along her palm.

“Just think about it. Take the paperwork, the void contract and the new one. Look over the plans, but this time take your time, as long as you need.” His thumb felt frantic against her skin even as his words were calm and even. “You’ll see. There are no lies, no tricks.”

She nodded. Like so many other things, he didn’t deserve this, but she would give it to him anyways. If only so that she could bring herself peace as well.

Aleksander pulled out a briefcase from behind the counter and Alina wondered how long he had been planning this. She accepted the neat stack of paperwork from him without a word.

“There is something else I need to tell you.” Aleksander said.

Alina chuckled softly, nervously. “I don’t think I could handle anything else,” she said honestly.

He didn’t acknowledge her hesitation. “There are some financial documents in there as well. I’m sure you remember the Drüskelle coffee advertisement?”

Alina stiffened. It wasn’t like she had forgotten, but she had definitely pushed it down on her list of grievances.

He continued on. “Well, you are legally entitled to a portion of the profits as it was your art used. I put it into an account for you. The information is all in there.” He gestured to the heavy pile in her hands.

“Okay.” Alina replied, not really knowing what else to say.

Aleksander turned away from her. “You should go now.”

She bristled at the clear dismissal, but she turned around without another word and walked out the door.

Alina looked at the papers the first thing when she got home, she hadn’t dared along the way home, fearful of dropping the loose-leaf pages. She had intended to go through the whole stack in one go, but she stalled after the first few pages.

Aleksander had put the financial papers first. She gaped down at the number on the page.

Fifty thousand dollars.

According to the document, Alina Starkov was entitled to a little over fifty thousand dollars.

With shaking hands she gathered all of the papers together. She opened her bottom desk drawer, the one she hardly ever used except to store random odds and ends, and deposited the papers in it.

She closed the drawer. And then she deleted her Tinder account.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ooff that was rough. Right? Did that feel rough? I can't tell anymore- I've been wrestling with this chapter for too long. Let me know, constructive criticism and typo patrols welcome!
> 
> Fan girl/boy comments are also welcome! (I like, live off of them.)
> 
> ANYWAYS, we are getting soooo close to the end of this!! Only two more chapters my loves. (omg nooooo, can't this go on forever?)
> 
> I have a [tumblr](https://smiling-penelope.tumblr.com/) now, so if you have one too, we should hang out! ♡


	27. Sol Koroleva

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This took me a month to write... I'm going to take a nap now.

Alina lay on her bed, staring blankly at the ceiling. She focused on its uneven texture, trying to make images and patterns, like a child painting pictures with clouds in the sky. She missed the glow-in-the-dark stars that used to litter the ceiling of her old room. If she had really wanted to, she could have put up more once she moved into Tolya and Tamar’s house, the three of them probably would have had fun doing it together. But it just hadn’t felt right to Alina, some sort of betrayal to her and Mal’s friendship.

Her eyes crossed in a way that brought attention to a headache that she hadn’t really noticed until then. With a sigh she turned over roughly on her bed.

Her phone was burning a hole in her pocket and the stack of paperwork was burning a hole in her desk. She wondered if she would let the fire consume her. She imagined her room burning, her old art of suns and stars curling with heat and smoldering at the edges. Alina screwed her eyes shut and let the flames lick up the sides of her desk. They traveled across the carpet to the cheery cloud print of her sheets and then merged with the inferno of her heart.

Another buzz came from her pocket, rocking her out of the morbid daydream. Alina’s eyes snapped open and she wriggled on the bed a little as she dug the offending object out of her pocket. She expected another text from Genya asking her what had happened.

Instead it was a text from Zoya.

>> Hey.  
>> Come help me paint the baby’s room.

Alina rolled her eyes, wincing again at her low-grade headache. She wanted to ask ‘don’t you have anyone else?’ But the fact of the matter was that Zoya didn’t. In the past few weeks Alina was starting to get a better image of the other woman’s life. Beyond the shield of her upturned nose and curtain of perfect ebony curls lay a very lonely woman.

But Alina had also found a woman who was shockingly loyal once won over, a woman who was quite funny when she wasn’t attacking, and a woman who was smart, brave, and interesting. Once Alina stopped seeing Zoya as her mortal enemy and dastardly rival in the fight for Mal’s love, she was frankly astounded by how much she actually enjoyed the other woman’s company.

>> Come on, we both know you aren’t doing anything else right now.

Okay, maybe that was going a little too far. Zoya was still annoying to her core, Alina was just finding it _harder_ to hate her for it.

Alina typed out a response.

<< Okay, okay. I’ll be there in an hour, don’t go into labor over it. Saints.

Painting a nursery wasn’t exactly Alina’s idea of a great Saturday afternoon, but it was a good excuse to ignore Genya’s texts. Besides, Zoya was right, she wasn’t doing anything better.

~ ~ ~ ~

“Alina Starkov.” An all too familiar voice assaulted Alina when the door to Zoya’s apartment opened. But it wasn’t Zoya in the doorway.

“Genya!? What are you doing here?” Alina’s eyes were wide with surprise and sheepishness.

“Cornering you.” Genya scowled.

“But- how- I didn’t think you knew Zoya.” Alina said as she slowly backed up against the door she just came through.

“Yeah, well, desperate times call for desperate measures,” Genya grabbed Alina by the wrist and yanked her into Zoya’s fancy living room. “You have been avoiding me for _days_ , you aren’t getting away now.”

Alina just stared at Genya defiantly. She didn’t want to talk about it, couldn’t talk about it, and she wasn’t going to just let Genya bully her into it. Amber eyes met brown eyes in a locked struggle.

“Paint first.” Zoya said as she entered the room. She rested a hand on her slowly growing stomach with a smirk.

“What?” The girls said in unison, breaking their intense eye contact to gape at Zoya.

“The two of you promised me that you’d paint. So before you both kill each other, paint.”

“I thought you were kidding about the paint.” Genya said.

Zoya snorted. “Pshh, like I would help you for nothing in return. Besides it’s not like the room is going to paint itself.”

“You could do it.” Genya pointed out.

Zoya pointed a finger at her stomach. “Hello? Pregnant?”

“Hire somebody then.” Genya countered.

Alina stayed quiet on the sidelines, recognizing a losing battle when she saw one. There was no fighting with Zoya on some things and Alina was more than happy for the distraction from the interrogation. The two continued to bicker for a few minutes before Genya finally gave up with a sigh and angry flutter of her hands.

The next thing Alina knew she was shoved into Zoya’s office turned nursery with Genya. They both clutched rolly paint brushes and were looking at the wide expanse of the walls dubiously. Alina sighed resignedly and worked to open a paint can.

“Spill.” Genya crossed her arms.

“Don’t you think I would have if I wanted to talk about it?” Alina snapped. “I’m not blind, I’ve seen your texts.” She poured some paint into a shallow pan and began to coat her brush in it.

“Come on Alina, don’t shut me out. Not again.”

Alina’s stomach dropped at the words and the emotion driving them.

“It just hurts so much.” She couldn’t look at her friend, focusing on the roll of her brush against the wall instead.

The paint was calm mint color. Zoya had decided not to find out the gender of the baby until it was born. Mal was due to return home a week before her due date, and if everything went according to plan, she hoped to share the surprise with him. There had been so much that he had missed, but this at least they could still share.

Genya’s brush started to roll beside hers. “I know.” She said softly, with so much more understanding that Alina thought she deserved. “But I think you need to talk about it anyways.”

Alina swallowed a lump that had formed in her throat. Genya was right.

So she told her. Starting from the beginning with details that she had never shared before. The two of them worked as Alina talked with Genya occasionally interjecting her thoughts.

“I can’t believe it.”

“That bastard.”

“Of course you aren’t.”

“What the fuck?”

“What in the actual fuck?”

By the time Alina got to the new contract, Genya had a permanent scowl on her face.

“I don’t know what to do with it.” Alina admitted, “I feel like I can’t trust myself to really understand what his terms are.”

“I mean… do you want me to take a look at it? I don’t know how much I’ll be able to help, but two pairs of eyes are better than one, right?”

Alina nodded dubiously, but she could already tell that neither of them had much faith in Genya’s ability to read it any better than Alina had.

“I could look it over.” Zoya’s voice sounded suddenly from the door way, startling the girls.

“I thought you couldn’t be near the fresh paint.” Genya accused.

“It’s a zero-VOC paint. I’ll be fine for a bit.” Zoya brushed some lint from her sweater casually, causing Genya to grit her teeth a bit. “So a contract? This wouldn’t have anything to do with Morozova would it?”

Alina shifted uneasily, “How did you know?”

“Ugh, it’s super obvious. You,” she pointed a neatly manicured finger at Alina, “are very transparent. And you,” she pointed to Genya next, “mumble under your breath. And the both of you? You gossip at a high volume. It doesn’t take a genius to figure it out.”

Alina and Genya tried to stutter out their protests, but Zoya cut them off again. “Let me see the contract, I’ll figure it out for you.”

“What makes you so certain that you’ll be able to understand it any better than me or Alina?” Genya crossed her paint splattered arms.

Realization fell over Alina in a sudden wave and her eyes snapped to Zoya. Her next words were spoken with an almost reverence, “Law school.”

Zoya nodded smugly. “That’s right bitches. Law school.”

~ ~ ~ ~

“Saints, Alina, why in the world would you ever sign this?” Zoya shook her head pityingly as she read over the original contract, highlighting key passages and efficiently flipping pages. “He was good in bed right? That’s like the only thing I can think of.”

Alina groaned and cradled her head in her hands. Genya rubbed reassuring circles on her back. The two of them were resting on her bed while Zoya sat at the desk to look over the papers.

Another page flip, another head shake. “Oh, for the love of all that is holy! Alina? Seriously?”

“Zoya, stop harassing her. It can’t be that bad, let me see it.”

Zoya handed over the contract.

Genya went pale as she read over the highlighted passages. She turned to Alina, “Just how hung was he?”

“That’s what I’m saying!” Zoya exclaimed gleefully.

Alina let out another bodily groan and flopped backwards onto the mattress. She covered her face with her hands, trying to block out them out. It seemed that the two of them were starting to bond in ways Alina knew she would soon regret.

More time passed, what felt like eternity, but really was only an hour. Zoya neatly shuffled the pages back together and set them on the desk. “Okay, I’m done.”

“What does it really say?” Alina asked her nervously.

“Move over and I’ll tell you, but first I have to get comfortable. Your shitty desk chair killed my back.” Zoya forced her way onto the bed beside Alina and Genya.

“Okay, here is the deal. For the first contract we have already established that you were acting with your vagina when you signed it and not your brain.”

“Zoyaaaa.” Alina moaned, shoving her face into a pillow.

“Let me finish, Starkov. You were an idiot, but the good news is that the contract is now legally void. There is a time clause on here that actually passed a few months ago.”

“But what does that mean?” Alina asked, muffled by the pillow.

“Basically we can get your art back at any time.”

Alina perked up a little. “Really?”

“Yes, but _let me finish_.” Zoya waited a second to be sure Alina wasn’t going to interrupt her again. “Okay, good. Now the second contract? It’s actually good. It’s really good. Almost as if a completely different person wrote it and I can’t find anything wrong with it.”

Alina frowned, but let Zoya keep going.

“Honestly, if I didn’t know anything at all about Morozova I would sign this right now. But knowing what I do, I still don’t trust this. Besides, just because the contract is fair, that doesn’t mean he won’t be an ass himself.”

“Agreed.” Genya chimed in.

“ _Not. Finished.”_ Zoya bared her teeth.

“I was agreeing with you though!”

Zoya just stared Genya down until she quieted as well.

“Okay, _finally._ This paperwork? Alina, you really are entitled to fifty thousand dollars. If I’m reading this right – and I know I am because I’m the top of my class – you just have to go to your closest bank, present the document, and the funds should be forwarded to your account within a week. I mean, there are taxes and fees of course, there always are, but the net loss is going to be so minimal that it hardly even matters and-”

“Zoya,” Genya interrupted. “Stop talking legal and start talking Ravkan.”

Zoya huffed dramatically, falling over Alina’s lap. “You, my dear, are now rich.”

Alina took in a shaky breath.

“I mean, not as rich as me, but _comparatively_. To what you were before, you are comparatively rich.” Zoya propped herself back up awkwardly, clearly underestimating the girth of her baby belly. “Now tell me,” she said dramatically, holding up an imaginary microphone. “You just won fifty thousand dollars. What are you going to do next?”

Genya pinched Zoya’s thigh hard enough to make her yelp. “Ignore her. But whatever it is? We’ll support you.”

The two woman nodded at Alina in sincere agreement.

Not knowing what to say, Alina rose from the bed and went to her desk where the neat pile of her future lay. She picked up the stack, gripped the pages in her hands so hard that they started to crinkle.

She stared at the fine print until her eyes crossed.

“Alina?” She wasn’t sure who said her name, it sounded far off in the distance, but it snapped her out of her thoughts anyways. She looked up at her friends.

“I’m going to get my art back, once and for all. But I’m going to need some help doing it.”

~ ~ ~ ~

Alina walked straight up to Aleksander, ignoring the patron he was trying to make a sale to, she handed him back the new contract, practically shoved it into his hands. He excused himself from the other person and started to flip through the contract.

He looked up with a raised eyebrow. “It’s not signed.”

“That’s because I’m not signing it.”

“It’s a fair contract, more than fair even.”

She could hear the slight irritation in his voice. _You were an idiot for signing the first contract and you would be an idiot now for not signing this one._

“I don’t care.” She replied flatly, defensively.

“You’d have so much to gain though.”

 _Just sign it._ He didn’t need to speak the words out loud, Alina could hear them all the same. _Just give in to me, to us._

But Alina couldn’t give in anymore, not without losing herself again. She wanted to explain it to him, that what he had to offer her wasn’t what she wanted or needed from him. She wanted to lay out all of her thoughts and feelings for him, but she didn’t think he would understand.

More than that, Alina was afraid he wouldn’t even care.

So instead of saying any more she just looked over her shoulder and made a waving gesture. It was the signal and her friends poured through the door.

Alina knew that she had friends, people to support her, but seeing them all together in Aleksander’s gallery just for her, it was almost overwhelming. Zoya and Genya led the way followed by Tolya and Tamar, then Alexei and Nikolai. Finally, David held up the rear of the group. He looked a little confused at his surroundings, but still, he was there.

Alina would never have asked Nikolai to help her in this way, she didn’t think it was her place to ask, but he had found out and demanded to come anyways. So there was only one person missing, but Alina knew that if he could have made it he would have.

With her friends at her back, Alina steeled herself, straightened to her full height, and turned her gaze back to Aleksander. He met her with a suspicious narrowing of his eyes, but Alina didn’t care. She wasn’t here for him. She was here for herself.

“I’m taking my art back.”

In that moment she felt regal. A queen standing on the crest of a hill, the sun at her back, ready to lead her army to war. She was rising above, taking back what was hers, and she was glorious.

Aleksander stared back at her with tight lips and fury in his eyes. But there was nothing he could do, their contract was void and the art was hers. He nodded towards the storage room and Alina led her friends-turned-soldiers to take back what was hers.

Alina was surprised to find her art dispersed throughout the storeroom. She had expected it to be neatly piled together and wondered if Aleksander had stored it this way on purpose. It would be like him to make this more difficult than it needed to be.

Alina and her friends looked through all the art, checking for her signature on the bottom right corner of every work before carrying it off to one of the two cars they had driven over in. It took a while, there was more art than Alina remembered, but the whole time Aleksander was conspicuously absent, seemingly fine with giving Alina free reign over the storage room.

None of the collaborative pieces she had made with Aleksander were left, he had sold them all for who knows how much. But she was glad that she had at least managed not to give Aleksander the right to sell her personal originals, just prints like the one used in the Drüskelle Coffee advertisement. Praise the Saints for small miracles.

“Okay, I think that we’ve looked through everything.” Nikolai said. He had assigned himself as organizer of the group, helping Alina to systematically work her way through all the art. “If you want, we could double check?”

“No, I think that’s it.” Alina replied with a weak smile.

Tolya and Tamar high-fived each other. Zoya, Genya, and- shockingly- David did a little dance.

“Finally,” Alexei said as he wiped imaginary sweat from his brow. “Don’t be so prolific next time okay?”

Alina stuck her tongue out at him before discussing what the next plan was. They decided on meeting back at Alina’s apartment for celebratory cupcakes (contributed by David of course), but with the added art, it seemed like they would be short one seat in the cars.

“Someone will just have to ride with me on the bike.” Nikolai said.

“Well it isn’t going to be me.” Zoya huffed, pointedly crossing her arms over her stomach.

Alina laughed. “I wouldn’t mind. I’m used to the death-trap by now.”

“Okay! Sounds like a plan, Stan! Let’s get going.” Nikolai made an elaborate bowing motion as he opened the door for everyone. The group filed out and Alina made to follow, but something caught her eye.

There was a discarded coffee sleeve sticking out of a drawer of one of Aleksander’s file cabinets. Alina knew it was none of her business and she should really get going, but curiosity moved her towards it. She gently pried it free to inspect it. It was a Ravkan Brew coffee sleeve and there was something drawn on it in permanent marker.

A sun in eclipse.

“Alina? What’s wrong?” Nikolai’s voiced sounded from beside her and she jumped, not realizing that he had approached her.

“Oh, um nothing.” She tucked the sleeve into her pocket. Her mind was spinning with thoughts.

_He kept it. But what does that mean? Does it mean anything at all? Shot in the dark. I guess I took a shot in the dark. Could it mean something? Do I even want it to mean something?_

“Alina.” This time it wasn’t Nikolai though. “I’d like to talk to you before you go.” Aleksander stood in the doorway to the storeroom. The way he said it wasn’t an invitation or a question, it was an order.

Alina bristled, ready for a fight, but Nikolai surprised her by speaking first. “I’ll be waiting for outside, okay? Take your time.” He said with false cheer. He was standing a little closer to Alina than he usually did and to her surprise he leaned in further, collecting her into a one armed hug to whisper into her ear. “Wreck him.”

Nikolai pulled away with a sad smile and walked out the door. She was left feeling little dazed and more than a little touched. Her heart swelled with the realization of how much Nikolai must have hurt himself to help her. She found herself wishing again that it could be Nikolai she loved.

“You are making a mistake.” Aleksander’s voice cut through her thoughts.

Alina whirled on him. “Why? Because I’m not doing what you want?”

“No, because you are letting an opportunity pass you by. You’re so talented, your art could touch so many people if you just let it.” There was a carefully crafted irritation in his words.

“Oh, and this contract is the only way to do that?”

“No, but it is the best way.” He said confidently.

Alina had to clamp down on a growl of frustration. “Don’t you dare think you know what is best for me! You said you wanted things to be different this time? Well then, this is what that looks like. You gave me an option and I decided not to take it. You don’t get to be mad about it now.”

He looked at her levelly. “I’m not mad.”

Alina laughed harshly. “Then what are you? Because you definitely aren’t singing with joy.”

Aleksander closed his eyes and took a deep breath, as if bracing himself for his next words. A painfully familiar furrow was starting to develop between his eyebrows.

 _Lies,_ Alina thought. _He always makes that face before he lies._

“In love with you.”

Aleksander’s eyes snapped open, immediately meeting her own. He could start a forest fire with his eyes alone and Alina was burning.

“I’m in love with you.” He ground out the words again, so clearly hating himself for each one. “And it’s the worst feeling in the world.”

Alina gaped at him. Her heart was flying and her stomach was plummeting. Her mind was screaming unintelligible gibberish, but her mouth uttered no noise.

“This is weakness,” he clutched a hand over his heart. “Wanting makes us weak. Wanting you makes me weak and I can’t stand it.”

For a long moment Alina didn’t know what to say. She was a riot of conflicting emotions stuffed into a too small container. But anger finally won, dominating over everything else.

“That is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard and beyond insulting. Wanting doesn’t make us weak, it makes us fucking human. You aren’t some special flower, Aleks, you are going to want and need - just like me, just like the rest of us.”

Without thinking Alina had used his nickname and his breath seemed to catch on it for a moment. She ignored it.

“You say that you love me, but I don’t see how you could love me and still do what you did. You say that you want me though, and it all makes sense. I’m a thing to you, some kind of toy for you to fight over the other boys for on the playground.”

“No.”

Alina ran a frustrated hand through her hair. “It’s the only thing that makes sense! You betrayed me.” Tears started to prick at her eyes. “You made me feel loved in a way I never had been before, but it was all a lie, clever tricks to get what you _wanted_ from me.”

He looked tortured, as if he didn’t know exactly what he wanted to say next. His hand ran through his own hair, causing Alina to hate herself for the spark of arousal that lit at the sight.

“Maybe at first.” He said the words hesitantly, carefully pacing his tone to sound like he was conflicted. “But it became so much more than that. You became more than that to me.”

She didn’t know why he was still trying. _Does he think I’m that stupid, that gullible?_

“But why then?” She challenged him. “If I really meant more to you, why would you give me the contract at all?”

He opened his mouth, and there was such a raw honestly in his eyes that Alina’s idiotic heart dared to hope. What for, she wasn’t sure. She couldn’t think of a single thing he could say to justify his actions. But it didn’t matter anyways, because as quickly as his face opened it closed back up, replaced with his cool mask.

“You betrayed me too, you know.”

“What?”

“You ran, you didn’t talk to me, didn’t give me a chance to explain. You just ran straight into someone else’s bed. Alina, you _cheated_ on me.”

His words sliced right through her. The cut was clean, but the edges burned.

Alina didn’t know what to say to defend herself, because what he said was true. It didn’t matter that she had pretty much considered their relationship effectively ended after she found out about the contract, because she hadn’t let Aleksander know that.

She had cheated on him.

But it wasn’t the same thing, not really. Her betrayal couldn’t even be measured on the same scale as his. Both were bad in their own ways, but at least Alina had some kind of justification for her actions. Aleks couldn’t even tell her why he did the things he did to hurt her.

Alina shoved her hands into her pockets, trying to conceal the nervous energy of her hands. Her fingers immediately scraped over her phone, running along it’s cracked surface.

Realization hit her then.

She could try and defend herself, try and explain away the awful thing she had done, or she could just admit it and move past it. Aleksander wasn’t giving his explanation and she didn’t want to give hers, but the least she could do is apologize.

“I know,” She replied simply. And it pleased Alina to see her words catch Aleksander off guard, if only for a moment.  “I should have broken up with you before I started what I did with Mal. And for that I’m sorry. But-”

“You shouldn’t have slept with him at all.” Aleksander cut her off. “You only turned to him because you wanted to rub it in my face. But I must admit, you took it a lot farther than I thought you would. How _did_ that engagement work out for you?”

Irritation pricked at her. He could be mad at her for cheating on him, but how dare he judge her and Mal’s relationship.

“Why must everything I do be about you? Why can’t I just want to do things for myself? You have no idea what I shared with Mal.”

“Because you wouldn’t tell me! You are so mad at me for obscuring the full nature of the contract, but you were keeping secrets as well. I didn’t even know his name until the night before you fucked him.”

Alina winced a little when Aleksander swore, it was so unlike him and suddenly she started to doubt her ability to read his emotions, or lack thereof. She had been working under the assumption that everything about him was carefully crafted to manipulate her. But now she wasn’t so sure.

She could feel that the conversation was slowly slipping out of both their control. It was like they were water-color painting with too wet brushes. Things were starting to bleed together where they shouldn’t, lines were becoming messy, ideas muddled.

“What do you want from me then, Aleks?” She used the nickname as a last resort. Hoping he would close back up or unravel further, either one would hopefully bring the conversation to a faster close.

His eyes darkened at her words, seemingly affected.

“Everything.”

Alina inhaled sharply at the admission.

Aleksander schooled his expression. “Anything,” he amended. “I want anything you will give me. Business partners, lovers, pen-pals… friends, _anything_. I just need you in my life.”

_Another lie?_

The watercolor of them was flooded and Alina couldn’t trust herself to know what was happening.

She grasped blindly at the last thing he said, filling her words with defensive derision. “Friends? I don’t even know what that would look like, other than some new and different way to take advantage of me.” She practically hurtled the words at him.

“Is that what you think of me? After everything I told you, you really think that all I want is to take advantage of you?” He asked and Alina’s stupid heart fractured over the edge in his voice.

He was so close to her, close enough to feel a slight breath of air on her face as he let out an exasperated sigh. She didn’t know when that had happened, how they had gravitated towards each other without noticing, but It was agonizing. They were a second away from touching, except Alina knew that she couldn’t dare. If she gave in now she would give in forever and she had come too far to let that happen.

“Why would I think anything else? After all you have done, what else could there be?”

His eyes flashed and his voice was rougher than she had ever heard it before. “Fine.” He bit out the word, so clearly not fine with it. “Make me your villain.”

His hand jumped up suddenly, but it came to land on her cheek softly, cradling it.

He ran his thumb against her bottom lip. “Then let me prove you wrong.”

She shivered under his touch and the intensity of his words.

It was too much, she needed space. Alina stepped back and took him in, his tight posture, the expression on his face – hunger tinged with pain, the defiant clench of his jaw. She couldn’t find the lie in his words or the deception in his stance. She wanted to believe him, but she was afraid. He was so good at lying to her, precisely because she wanted his lies to be true.

They stood for a long moment, silently staring each other down. “Maybe.” Alina finally said. Her heart had wanted her to say yes and her mind wanted her to say no, so she settled on the middle ground. She pulled his hand away from her face. “That’s all I can give you, and it’s probably more than you deserve.”

She turned, not wanting to see his reaction to her words, and started to walk towards the door. There was a scrabbling sound and Alina was brought up short by two black shadows skittering towards her along the floor. Volcra and Vo’ya must have been sleeping or confined to Aleks’s office, but they had broken free and were now dancing around her feet happily. They made excited panting noises and pawed at Alina’s legs, oblivious to the tension between her and their owner.

It had been so long since she last saw them, but they greeted her like no time had passed. The tears Alina had been holding back in front of Aleksander now ran freely down her face. She knew that she should just leave. They had said what they needed to say and staying now was just making every second hurt worse, but Alina knelt down anyways.

She let the doggy kisses wash over her, ruffled silken, black fur, and wrapped the puppies into an uneven hug.

“I’m sorry I’m leaving again.” She whispered to them, before standing up suddenly.

Alina continued to move forward. She heard Volcra and Vo’ya whine as she opened the door to leave, followed by a stern “heel” from Aleksander.

She knew she shouldn’t, knew it would only rip her apart more, but Alina took one last look over her shoulder. The twin mournful looks on the dogs’ faces tugged at her heart painfully. But the undefinable look on Aleksander’s face was somehow so much worse.

“Dog photos.” She said with sudden desperation. “Does friendship include pictures of the puppies?”

“Unlimited.” Aleksander murmured.

She nodded stiffly in reply then walked out of the gallery feeling less certain that she could read Aleks’s intent than ever before.

~ ~ ~ ~

Nikolai took one look at Alina’s face as she approached and seemed to know better than to ask her what happened. He offered her his spare helmet. “Back to the apartment?”

Alina nodded absentmindedly for a second, before realizing that there was still something she needed to do.

“Actually, could we go to the bank first?” She asked him, strapping on the helmet with practiced ease.

“Anywhere your heart desires, my Queen.” He said with another outlandish bow.

Alina gave a wet little giggle. “You _have_ to stop doing that.”

“I will when it stops cheering you up, if only a little.”

~ ~  ~ ~

Almost a week had passed since the rescue of her art, but Alina was still in a shockingly sour mood. It was bad enough that even Genya had stopped pestering her, knowing that Alina needed space to think or else she would cut everyone.

It didn’t help that she was _still_ blocked. Alina had tried to cheer herself up with some retail therapy, but even replenishing her art supplies did little to lift her heart. Now she just had a pile of fresh, untouched art supplies cluttering her desk, laughing at her.

Alina violently scrunched up the page of her sketchbook that she had been working on with a rough sigh.

Nothing felt right anymore, but she couldn’t figure out why.

It used to be so easy, ideas and colors practically bursting from her fingertips, especially when she was supposed to be doing anything other than making art.

How had she done it?

Alina shoved herself off her bed to the corner of her room that was now a chaotic mess of her old art. She flipped through it with pangs of jealous nostalgia. Sure, most of the pieces were rough, lacking in technique, but they more than made up for it in heart and soul.

She ran a light finger across a particularly bright Sun Woman she had painted. She remembered how excited she had been to make it. Fresh out of art school with a promising future, she had picked only the brightest of her acrylic paints for the piece. She hadn’t even cracked open the tube of ebony black.

But now she found herself wishing that she had. Alina rarely wanted to go back and change her art and almost never did. It was best to ignore the compulsion as making too many changes often led to a worsening of quality, rather than improvement.

This time, as Alina flipped through the piles, she was overwhelmed by how much her fingers itched to reach for her darker art supplies.

Shadows. She loved her old art with its bright colors and vibrant intensity. But in so many ways it lacked a critical depth that only shadows could give.

All this time she had been blocked because she had been clinging to how she made art before she met Aleksander. But he had changed her in more ways than her technique alone.

Sure, she had art instructors constantly lecturing her on the merits of a well-placed shadow, but Alina had always rebelled against them as much as she could, insisting that this was her style and her art was better this way.

But just as she had gently encouraged Aleks to intensify his shadows by adding light to his work, he had deepened her brightness with shadow.

Aleksander had come into her life, calm and reassuring, the relief of shade on a burning summer day. Alina had felt confident around him, because he was confident in her. She had been so lost, fearing that her art would bring her nothing. But he had proven her wrong.

If only he hadn’t betrayed her while doing it.

Alina pulled a blank canvas out of her closet. It was something she had bought before she had ever met Aleksander and it had been quite the splurge at the time. Expensive enough that she had been afraid to even sketch an idea on it. For years it sat unused behind a mess of clothes and shoes, because she hadn’t been confident enough to put her heart on it.

How could she have been when she had kept her heart in chains?

But now things were different, she could buy a hundred of this type of canvas without a blink of an eye. (There were even a few of them being shipped to her at that moment.) But more than that, Alina didn’t want to hide anymore.

She dipped her brush into an almost unused pot of black paint and thought of the burning feel of Aleksander’s lips on her neck. Without bothering to sketch an outline with a soft pencil, she brought the brush to the bottom of the canvas and thought of the painful strength she had needed to step away from the unhealthy relationships with the men in her life. With every stroke on the canvas Alina let herself just be.

Her thoughts came and went with the rhythmic angle of her brush. She didn’t let herself judge, didn’t try and change the way she felt. She let herself just be. All the pain, guilt, joy, laughter, tears, and pride in her life flowed from her heart to her fingertips to the canvas and back again. There was no hesitation, no second-guessing of the thickness of her lines or the boldness of her color palate. She didn’t need hesitation when she was painting a masterpiece.

She didn’t need hesitation when she was painting herself.

The image she desired spread rapidly over the canvas and it was only a matter of a few hours before it was done. With an exhausted, but content sigh she grabbed a permanent marker. She carefully wrote the title of the piece along the thick edge of the canvas.

_“Sol Koroleva”_

Alina stared back at her own image and knew she had finally found herself again in the brushstrokes of her art.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my lord. I hope that you guys liked this, it took me about 2x longer than I thought it would and was about 10x more difficult than I thought it would be. I expect the next and final (sobs) chapter to be the same if not worse... ^-^; We will see!
> 
> Ooooh, but I do have good news! I quit my full-time job in anticipation of upcoming dental school! So, I will have about 3 months of freedom to do as I please. And you best know fanfic is near the top of the list!!
> 
> ♡ Happy Birthday ZodiacAthena1903 & macheron! ♡
> 
> Anyways, typo patrols welcome! Kudos if you like! Let me know what you think in the comments (it helps me to write the next chapter, I swear! xD)
> 
> 7/6/18 Update: I'm so so sorry that the next chapter has taken so long. But it _is_ getting worked on and is actually in beta processes. I have have no idea how long that's going to take, but just know that I haven't given up on this fic!


	28. A Phone Call

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This isn't the last chapter btw...

 “She asked me what I wanted from her and I said ‘ _everything_.’” Aleks took in a shaky breath, hating the weakness in his voice. “I know. You don’t have to look at me like that. I know it was too much, but it’s _true_. Saints… I’m fucking pathetic.”

He wanted to hit something, anything, like some brainless grunt punching holes in the wall when he didn’t get his way. In the past when he had felt like this, felt so strongly, he had just channeled it into his art. But that wasn’t an option anymore. It hadn’t been an option for months.

He was blocked. Every single canvas in his studio had been painted solid black, and he hadn’t been able to get anything else on them. He felt like some common wall painter, not the acclaimed Aleksander Morozova, artist and gallery owner. He might as well buy a paint roller and hideous jumpsuit to make the transition complete.

“It’s just… I laid everything out in front of her, my thoughts and feelings, and she brushed them  all aside, dismissed everything I had to say as lies.”

Alina had said that wanting was not a weakness, but after their conversation, he was left feeling more vulnerable and fragile than he had thought possible. She had eviscerated him then left him again, but not before instilling a blistering spark of hope in his chest. It was so much worse than an absolute would have been. And then to say that a “maybe” was more than he deserved? Aleks shook his head and sighed.

If she had said “no,” finally and firmly shutting the door behind her, he wondered if that wouldn’t have felt better. He could have moved on then. It would have taken time and more effort than he would like to admit, but eventually he would have patched over the gaping hole she left inside of him. Instead he was left wondering. Was there a way he could fix this or would he spend some indefinite time hurting until she finally decided she was better without him and put him out of his misery? His attempts to apologize and explain hadn’t been enough for her. He wondered if anything he said would be good enough for her.

He wondered when he would stop aching to be good enough for her.

There was a soft pawing at his leg and Aleks was shaken out of his thoughts. He ran his hand over Volcra’s soft head, curving his fingers at just the right angle he knew she liked.  

“I thought you were asleep,” he murmured.

He had been sitting on the couch far longer than he had meant to, pinned down because he didn’t want to wake her by getting up. Vo’ya had joined them, wedging herself firmly between Aleks and the arm of the sofa, and he had struck up a conversation with her.

Aleks didn’t usually hold such long, one sided exchanges with his dogs, but he found himself needing to work through this, and there wasn’t a single human he would want to have a discussion of his flaws with. Vo’ya’s soulful brown eyes invited him to do just that. Volcra’s as well, now that she wasn’t snoring on his lap.

At least he didn’t gush and coo over them like they were babies. He wasn’t that far gone.

“She wants pictures of you two.” Aleks gave a soft chuckle. “How angry do you think she would be if I photo-bombed every one?”

But his amusement was fleeting, and he quickly settled back into a brooding silence.

Maybe there had been truth in both their words. He stood by his assertion that wanting was a weakness, but Alina was also right. Everyone had wants and everyone had needs. Including her. He just wasn’t used to caring about others desires unless they got him closer to his own.

If he thought hard enough about it, and oh, he had, he could still feel the phantom press of her lips against his. The way her teeth had raked across his skin that day in the abandoned coffee shop, angry in their desire, still haunted him. She had flung herself against him, basically attacked him, with a passion that was more hatred than desire.

Yet the desire had been there. Alina wanted him. She didn’t _want_ to want him, but she carried the same weakness for him that he did for her.

Aleks wondered if that was love, though, this unrelenting agitation, this consuming need. It sounded more like lust. But he didn’t just want Alina, he wanted _for_ her. He wanted to see how much she could grow, he wanted to see her fulfilled and happy, he wanted to see her shine.

He wanted all of that, even if he wasn’t in her life, even if the thought of her having it without him made his teeth clench and his jaw ache. Because what he really wanted was for her to have all of that _and_ him. So he didn’t know if that was love or weakness or some mix of the two. But in all the time they had been apart, he hadn’t found a way to stop wanting. So, if he had to be weak... if it was with her, maybe he could bear it.

He just wondered how much longer he could wait.

~ ~ ~ ~

There was something that haunted Alina, dug into her dreams at night and pulled up images of steely grey eyes and burning touches. It lurked in the shadows of her everyday life, waiting for calm, absentminded moments to stick out its barbs and make its presence known. It caused her mind to stutter and her body to falter for a just a moment before she could wrestle the painful thing back into a dark corner of her chest.

_What if he wasn’t lying? What if he does care?_ The thoughts picked at the open wounds of her heart.

If she wasn’t careful, on guard, the thoughts continued, nurtured by her own loneliness and self-doubt. _What would you be throwing away, then? How much would you lose? How much will you have already lost?_

It was all she could think about in the quiet spaces of her day. It was all she could think about in the dead of night. _He said he could prove you wrong. So why won’t you at least let him try?_

Sometimes it was just all she could think about.

It had been during a moment of weakness that she had asked for a picture of Volcra and Vo’ya. It had also been a moment of curiosity. How would he respond? Would he try to start a conversation with her? Would he call her and demand to see her? Would he say that he loved her again?

He had done none of those things, just sent her a picture as asked. She had never been so let down by two perfectly adorable dogs before.

Alina hadn’t wanted to analyze how she felt after that, because what she felt was messy and complicated and didn’t make any sense.

All she knew was that she was going to ask for another picture, and would keep asking until some unnamable thing shifted.

~ ~ ~ ~

Alina’s days were filled to the brim. She rolled out of bed before the sun’s lazy rays could fall on her pillow, bleary-eyed, but excited. And she only returned hours after night had fallen.

There was always paint on her somewhere. It didn’t matter how carefully she scrubbed or how long she let the shower’s spray hit her, there were still traces of it everywhere. She found cobalt blue caked in the delicate hair at the nape of her neck, flecks of red carmine in the crook of her elbow, persistent stains of green under her fingernails, and inexplicable smudges of black on the outside of her ankles.

The nights, though were empty. Alina would clutch her stiff, callused fingers around a steaming mug of tea as she tried to block out the empty sounds of her new little apartment. Tolya and Tamar had insisted they loved having her live with them whether or not she helped in the restaurant, but with her newfound small fortune had come an urge for independence. She still spent a significant amount of time at their place (they insisted on packing her diet with hearty Shu food), as well as at Zoya’s (which was still weird), and Genya and David’s (they had finally taken the plunge and moved together into a small townhouse that constantly smelled of vanilla and brown sugar).

Alina had plenty of social interactions with her friends, so it wasn’t that she regretted living alone. Most of the time she found it less lonely than living with others. She never wondered when somebody would return home because it was just her. Before living alone, she had never realized how lonely waiting was.

There was also a distinct pleasure in having a space that was completely hers and only hers. If the sink was messy or the shower drain clogged, well that was her fault and she knew exactly when she’d get to it. The couch was a perfect mess of pillows and blankets and the cabinets were finally arranged in a way that made sense.

For the first time, Alina felt a little bit like an adult. She was back on track with her artistic dreams and completely independent. The apartment was conveniently located less than a block away from the small storefront she was in the process of converting into her own studio.

But the perks of living alone didn’t make the space any less empty, especially after lifetime of living with others by necessity. So it wasn’t really a surprise then when Alina ended up bringing  something small and furry home. It was kitten, tiny and white, looking more like a snowball than anything of the feline species. She had gone with Genya to the animal shelter, just to look and maybe pet a few cats and dogs. She hadn’t anticipated that she would bring anything home, hadn’t even been considering it. But the moment she had heard the tiny thing’s shockingly loud mewls, there had been nothing Genya could say to talk her out of it.

Alina had thought she was exclusively a dog person, that she prefered clumsy exuberance and lolling tongues to feline grace and cool gazes. Cats had always seemed so independent to her, so aloof. And maybe there was some truth to that, but there was nothing of those features in the blur of white fluff that had pounced upon her and demanded attention.

The kitten was unexpected and magical. She was also chaos incarnate, so without putting much thought into it, Alina named named her Merzost. It wasn’t until after she had told all her friends that she remembered where she had learned the word and who she had learned it from.

~ ~ ~ ~ 

It had been a relief at first when Mal came home a month earlier than his last post card had suggested.

Alina had opened her door, ready to tell off whoever was banging on it with so much insistence. “What the hell do you-- Mal! You’re home early!” She took an excited step forward, lifting her arms for a hug, then hesitated.

Were hugs allowed now? Would it be weird? She considered, but Mal also took a step forward and she knew that _not_ hugging him would make it awkward. She didn’t want that, just as much as she _did_ want a hug from her best friend.

It was quick but it was fierce. Alina’s feet rose off the ground and, from the little huff Mal made, she was pretty sure she was suffocating him.

They released each other and Alina ushered him inside. She had sent a quick letter to him with her new address to let him know she had moved out of Tolya and Tamar’s, but this was his first time seeing her new home. Mal dropped his large hiking backpack down in the narrow entryway and took a quick peek around. It didn’t take long, but he looked pleased with what he saw.

“It’s so you,” he said as he sat down on her sofa and spread out, already completely at home. “It’s lovely.”

“Better than all of those hostels you’ve been staying at?” Alina teased.

“Alina, I found a spider nest in my bed at one of them. Anything is better than that.”

“High praise!”

“The highest.” He grinned.

“Do you want anything to drink?” Alina went to her fridge and peered inside. “Uh... you can have water. Or cold water.”

“Ah, with amities like that, you should open a hotel! You could fit what? Two, maybe three people on this couch alone.”

“Hey, if you wanted fancy stuff, you should have gone to Zoya’s.” She said, expecting another quip in return. But when he didn’t respond she turned around to find him looking confused, and uncertain if he should be offended.

“What?”

“Why would I go to Zoya’s?”

“You don’t…. She didn’t…?” Alina shut herself up, not wanting to reveal something that wasn’t hers to reveal.

She had assumed he knew. Zoya had told her that he did and just needed some time to think. But Alina should have realized that Mal wouldn’t need “time to think.” He would have been ecstatic from the moment he found out, eager to be there for his child the way no one had been for him. In her defense it would have make a certain kind of sense, wouldn’t it? He was already on a soul-searching journey of sorts, what was a little extra time to come to terms with something so huge? There had just been so much going on in her own life that she had let the subject drop, satisfied with the easy answer.

The relief at Mal’s homecoming was quickly leaking away to be replaced with a grim anger. Alina knew Zoya was scared, but she shouldn’t have kept Mal in the dark, and she definitely shouldn’t have lied about it.

“What?” Mal asked.

As mad as she was, Alina still didn’t feel like she could tell Mal, and that only made her more angry. She held up a finger, asking him to be quiet and to wait, and went into her bedroom to call Zoya. The other woman picked up after the first ring, but it still felt like an eternity of waiting.

“Starkov, I can’t really talk--”

“You said you told him.” Alina cut her off angrily, not needing to specify who the “him” was.

“I was going to! I really was. I just….” Her voice faltered. “Is he back?”

“Yes! He’s literally sitting in my apartment right now!” She hissed into the phone.

“No. He’s not supposed to be back yet. He _can’t_ be. I... I’m not ready.”

“You were never going to be ready though, not really, but you can’t just sit on this kind of stuff. This isn’t something that will just go away if you ignore it.”

“I know,” Zoya snapped. “Of course I fucking know that. I’m so huge that I could paint wobbly green stripes on my stomach and no one would be able to tell me apart from a watermelon! I’m not ignoring it, I just... needed more time to prepare.”

“And what? Mal isn’t going to need some time to prepare too? He deserves to know.” She replied firmly, while still trying to keep her voice from being overheard. “And if you don’t tell him, I will, and I doubt you’ll like how I do it.”

For once, Zoya didn’t have a retort. In a small, resigned voice, she said, “Okay. Okay, I’ll be there soon.”

Alina softened a little at her friend’s defeated tone. “It’ll be okay Zo. But you have to… you know. It’s not just you anymore.”

“I know,” she whispered back before hanging up.

As soon as Alina was back in the living room, Mal asked, “What’s going on? Since when do you call Zoya ‘Zo?’ Or have her phone number?”

Alina frowned, realizing that he must have managed to overhear at least of the tail end of the conversation, probably by pressing his ear to the door just as they used to do when they were children and wanted to hear the fates that strange adults had instore for them. A punishment? Yet another home reassignment? The memories of it made her feel even worse. The urge to confess everything then and there was almost a physical need, like the first gasp of air after holding one’s breath for too long.

But she had promised Zoya just a little more time. Besides, it would be better for him to hear it from Zoya herself. Alina took a deep breath, willing her face to be placid.“How about that water?” She asked with false cheer, even though she knew he wouldn’t buy it.

“Alina.”

“I know it’s boring, but it’s not like I was expecting company tonight and I’ve been too busy to go to the grocery store, and--”

“Alina!”

“I can’t tell you, okay? She’ll be here soon so just… let me get you some water.” Alina busied herself in the kitchen, turning the simple task of grabbing a glass and turning on the tap into a process that required surgical focus, ignoring the feeling of Mal’s eyes on her back. She even broke out her ice tray, working on only the most stubborn pieces. When she finally handed it to him drained the glass in one long motion. His hands shook when he placed the emptied glass on the coffee table. In fact, he was actually looking a bit pale.

“Mal?” She asked tentatively.

“How long?”

“What?”

“How long does she have left?” He looked downright wretched.

“That’s… a weird way to put it, but ok. About a month,” she said gently.

“A month.” He parroted her flatly. “I mean, I know I left things… unresolved. But, just a month? And she didn’t even tell me?”

Alina sat down next to him, taking his hand in hers. “She was scared, Mal. I’m not saying it’s an excuse, and to be honest I thought you knew, but….”

“Of course she’s scared! She’s about to… to….”

“Pop?” Alina offered.

“Pop? Saints, Alina!” He yanked his hand away from hers. “What’s wrong with you? I know you don’t like her, but how could you be so callous?”

Alina looked at him, totally confused now. “What?”

“I thought you were better than that. To put it so flippantly….” he shook his head in obvious disappointment.

“It’s an expression, Mal,” Alina said, her brow furrowing. “A pretty common one. I mean maybe it’s not the most respectful way to put it, but I’m pretty sure she wouldn’t mind. And I don’t _hate_ her. She’s actually kind of grown on me” She smirked a little. “Not unlike a fungus.”

“What, so that makes it okay?” His voice was rising along with his temper.

“Ummm…. Yes? I don’t understand why you’re so upset. I mean, I’m glad you’re protective, but this seems kind of extreme.”

“What are you-- She’s been going through this alone, and I should have been here to help her!”

“Yeah, that would have been nice, but how were you supposed to do that when you didn’t even know? She told me you knew, or I would have made her tell you earlier. It’s not fair, and I’m sorry about that, but I hope you can understand why she hid it. And besides, of all the things to miss, this is the easy part. It’s the next two decades or so that are really going to be the challenge. Feeding, diapers, projectile vomit, screaming in the middle of the night, skinned knees, puberty, the intrinsically awkward but necessary sex... talk….” Alina trailed off, because Mal was starting to go white.

“Oh come on, it won’t be _that_ bad. I was just trying to distract you. You’ll do great, I know you will. Both of you will.”

“So… Zoya… she’s not… sick? Dying?”

“ _Dying?_ Saints, no! I mean, I know childbirth is dangerous, but….” Alina froze, then groaned as realization hit her right between the eyes.  “Oh. Oh, no. I didn’t even last ten minutes. She’s going to kill me.”

“Well.” Mal said, his voice a little strangled from emotional whiplash. “Pregnant. That’s… much better, isn’t it?” He looked like he had dodged a bullet, only to have fallen into a pit of quicksand.

“I would have to say it is.” She replied with a relieved little smile.

“Right. I just thought… wait, is that a cat?”

~ ~ ~ ~

Alina walked to the park, not really knowing what else to do with herself. She was glad that Mal and Zoya were making up, but couldn’t they have done that in Zoya’s apartment instead of hers?

In the time it had taken Zoya to get to Alina’s apartment, Mal had turned a full one-eighty from thinking she was dying to being just as ecstatic about her pregnancy as Alina had known  he would be. By the time there was a tentative knock at the door he had practically been vibrating with excitement. He had sprung  up and opened it before Alina could even think to protest, “ _You know this is still my house, right?_ ”

But any objections that Alina might have made had died on her lips at the sight of Mal greeting Zoya. His ear to ear smile had been one of the widest Alina had ever seen on him, and he hadn’t hesitated even a second before wrapping Zoya in a delicate, but firm hug.

Zoya had sniffled, and then there had been a muffled, “I’m sorry.”

Alina could hardly believe her ears. Zoya Nazyalenski was apologizing.

“I forgive you,” Mal responded without any hesitation.

And then they had started to make out.

Vigorously.

Much to Alina’s chagrin, she knew just how quickly Zoya and Mal could move from making out, to heavy petting, to naked adult activities. With that kind of gusto she wasn’t 100% convinced that he wouldn’t defy well established biological science and get her pregnant a second time before she could get the first one out. There wasn’t really anywhere safe to escape to in her small apartment so she had decided to go for a walk. She’d awkwardly slid herself past the intertwined couple, neither of whom had even noticed her pass.

Alina could only hope Zoya’s very pregnant state would stop them from doing anything too… involved. She would probably need to wash her sheets and the sofa covers just to be safe. And spray all the flat surfaces in the kitchen and bathroom with bleach. And possibly some of the walls. Alina rolled her eyes skyward in a silent prayer that they wouldn’t get that far.

It was a nice evening, at least. The air was warmed by the first hints of summer coming to Ravka, and there was a light scent of caramelized sugar in the air from a nearby ponchiki stall. The park was alive with sound: dogs woofing, children on the playground, the low cooing of pigeons, and the constant murmur of conversation.

Alina pulled a few bills from her pocket and went to the ponchiki stall. She bought a little paper sleeve of the soft balls of fried dough and munched on them as she walked. Unconsciously, she found herself moving toward the center of the park, following one of her old routes until she came to her favorite spot. When she had done caricatures for extra cash, she had liked this bench, and the large tree it sat under for its shade during long shifts. At this point in the day, the rough wood was saturated with the last rays of the sunset, but she was here to relax, not spend eight hours working - and probably leaving with a sunburn for her trouble - so the light was more than welcome. It was peaceful to people watch and she snuggled into her coat as she ate.

Peaceful but lonely.

A large black dog ran past and Alina’s heart caught in her throat before she realized that it wasn’t Vo’ya. The dog - a black lab, she realized now, not a Groenendael -  leaped into the air to catch a Frisbee, then ran back to its owner.

She pulled out her phone and opened her conversation with Aleksander, if it could really be called a conversation. It was just her awkward texts asking for dog pictures followed by said pictures from him. There were never any words on his side, no attempts to start a conversation. It was exactly what she had wanted, what she had asked for.

It wasn’t really what she wanted, though. It wasn’t enough, had never really ever been enough. But Alina wasn’t sure what exactly would be enough for her. And even if she knew what she wanted, she had no idea how to go about getting it. All she knew knew for certain was that she didn’t want a dog photo from Aleksander, she wanted a conversation.

She typed almost unthinkingly.

<< How was your day?

She winced as she hit the send button. It was reckless, confusing, and awkward as hell to just text him that out of the blue. It wasn’t even the more expected ‘Hi’ or ‘How are you?’ Instead she was asking him a relatively personal question after a good month of near radio silence.

What was he going to think of her?

Would he even respond?

Why was she letting herself care so much?

Alina wasn’t sure if-

>> Long. I actually just got home and I’m having a hard time trying to decide what to eat.

>> You?

Her eyes widened, and after only a brief hesitation, her thumbs practically flew over the keyboard.

<< I know that feeling. I would recommend against ponchiki.

>> Please tell me you had more than ponchiki for dinner.

<< Guilty as charged.

The exchange was so silly, so mundane, but it still set her heart rate skittering.

They texted until the sun set in earnest and Alina’s nose grew too cold to ignore. It was time for her to go back and reclaim her apartment.

Thankfully, when she got home it seemed Zoya and Mal had already cleared out. Nothing looked too out of place, but Alina started to gather up the washable surfaces just to be safe.

There was relief there, to not have to deal with the confrontation of others in her space, but there was also a hollowness.

Her phone buzzed in her pocket.

Alina smiled and her apartment no longer felt as empty.

~ ~ ~ ~

They looked perfect together, the three of them. Zoya was flushed and sweaty, curls damp and clumped to her forehead, but her smile was rapturous as she looked at the bundle in her arms. Mal leaned over her, awed wonder in his eyes and a tentative smile on his lips as he pulled back the blanket around his newborn son’s face.

The baby gave a week little cry, hardly even a whimper, but both of his parents’ eyes became wide and uneasy. Mal made a little shushing noise and Zoya pulled her bundle tighter to her chest. Then there was a soft huff as the baby yawned his way back to into peaceful sleep.

Lit by the low light of the hospital room, Mal and Zoya exchanged relieved smiles. _We can do this,_ their mouth said without moving. W _e’re in this together._

Alina suddenly felt like she was intruding. The room seemed too hot, the air too heavy, and she mumbled an excuse about grabbing some coffee, backing out of the room with soft footsteps.

The hallway was better, cooler and less claustrophobic. She walked until she came across a hot drink vending machine. It looked about 20 years old, with yellowed pictures of steaming beverages and worn buttons. She put in a few pieces of loose change and pressed the button for a mocha. There definitely wasn’t an option for a coconut latte with no foam, but she figured that the the sugar and chocolate would mask the poor quality of the coffee. The hulking machine made some gurgling and hissing noises before it released a stream of steaming liquid into a disposable cup. While it chugged away, Alina leaned back on it and let her emotions wash over her.

It wasn’t that she wasn’t happy for Mal and Zoya. It wasn’t even that she was jealous. She was just… lonely. She knew she would always be welcome in their lives, but it was just that, _their_ lives. Mal had a nuclear family now, something Alina knew he had ached for all his life. She would be lying to herself if she didn’t admit it was something she had always wanted, too. It had even been something she had wanted with him.

She pressed the home button on her phone absentmindedly, thinking that she might text Genya or Tamar to let them know everything had gone well. But as she opened her messages, she found that there was only one person she wanted to text.  

Her thumb hovered over his name. She had texted him immediately when Zoya had gone into labor, before Mal even. She and Zoya had been resting on the couch while Mal went out to grab some pork rinds for Zoya, a pregnancy craving that they teased her relentlessly about, when Zoya turned to Alina with wide eyes to say, “It’s time,” in a voice hollowed with panic.

It would have made more sense to text Mal first of course, but in the initial phase of shock that _OMS this is actually happening_ , she found herself messaging Aleksander instead. She had been texting him more recently, their conversation at the top of her contacts, but even that coupled with her momentary panic didn’t really explain why he had been the first person she wanted to tell.

But they had been texting off and on for weeks and he would want to know how everything went, so why was she hesitating now? She forced herself to just do it, get it out of the way before she thought about it too hard or he started to worry.

<< Zoya gave birth and is doing good.

Her fingers continued to move across the screen despite her uncertainty.

<< A beautiful, healthy baby boy.

<< I’ll send a picture later, if you want.

It was late, almost two in the morning, but Aleksander responded immediately.

>> Congratulations!

>> I would like that.

Alina could almost imagine the warm little smile that might have accompanied that text.

The shape of his lips if he had said the words out loud instead.

And suddenly it wasn’t enough for her anymore. She didn’t want to have to imagine it, she wanted to see it for herself. Alina was treading on thin ice. It would be so easy to press the small phone icon. It would be so easy to fall into the freezing water.

“Alina? Are you okay?”  
   
She was jolted from her spiraling thoughts and whispering impulses by Mal who was standing in front of her.  
   
“Oh, um… yeah, I’m fine.” She shoved her phone into her pocket and tried to give him a smile, but she could tell it was weak.  
   
“Really? Because you left to go get coffee about a fifteen minutes ago, but instead you’re just leaning against the coffee machine. You know that’s not how it works right? You gotta press the buttons first.”  
   
Alina scoffed, “I know how to work a vending machine, thank you. I’m just spacing out because I’m exhausted.” She shifted to pick up her coffee and took sip of it, trying not to wince at the sweetness. “There, see?”  
   
Mal gave her a very unconvinced look. “What’s wrong? And don’t try to say you’re just tired, because you know I know you better than that.”  
   
She took another sip, the sugar already starting to form a fuzzy film on her teeth. She was avoiding his eyes, keeping her gaze trained on the lightly speckled linoleum floor. “It’s Aleksander.”

“I wondered.” He voice softened.

Her eyes flicked up to his face and she wasn’t quite sure what she had expected to see - disappointment or old anger made fresh again - but she hadn’t expected a small understanding smile. He tipped his head towards a nearby bench, inviting her to sit with him.

“I could tell. You know? When we were together, you refused to talk about him or your art or what he did to you, but I could tell that you were always thinking about him.”

She wrapped her arms around herself, feeling guilty even though she knew that wasn’t his intent. “I’m sorry.”

“Hey, you don’t have to apologize again. I’m fine. I mean, I wasn’t fine with it at the time and I’m sure I was a dick about it, but I was doing the same thing with Zoya. I couldn’t get her out of my head, but I had already hitched my pony cart to you.”

Alina couldn’t help the laugh she gave at that, a sort of awkward snort that made her laugh even harder. “Oh great, so I’m a pony now?”

He cracked a little grin. “You know what I mean.”

She stuck her tongue out at him and he mimicked her back for a moment before becoming serious again.

“I think you should at least talk to Morozova. I’m not saying what he did was right, not a chance in hell. I still want to fucking pulverize him over it, but... you were happy with him before he messed everything up, happier than I think I’ve ever seen you. You sort of... came alive. Or more alive I guess, if that makes sense. I’ve been talking to Zoya about it-”

“What?!” Alina hissed. In any other place, at a different time of day, she would have yelled, but in the quiet hospital hallway she just barely managed to keep her voice down. “Since when do you and Zoya chit-chat about my love life?”

“Zoya and I talk about almost everything.” He said candidly.

“Well, could you stop?”

“Nope.”

Alina must have looked ready to actually start shouting, because Mal held his hands up like he was trying to calm a spooked horse. Or more accurately, a spooked pony. “Look, it’s not like we’re trying to talk behind your back. It’s just that you won’t talk to either of us about it, so we’re pulling our resources together, that’s all.”

She frowned. “That sounds even worse.”

“We just care about you.”

Part of Alina wanted to insist that it still wasn’t any of their business, but a larger part was touched that they cared. She nodded hesitantly for him to continue.

“Well, Zoya was telling me about some of the Tinder dates you’ve been going on-- not in detail!” He assured her quickly. “Mostly just the fact that you were dating, but it wasn’t really going anywhere. Then you met up with Morozova and the dates stopped altogether. And I just wonder if maybe….”

He hesitated, and in the space between his words, her mind leapt to a single outcome: _I just wonder if maybe… you should give him another chance._

“…you’re stuck.”

Her mind floundered for a moment, caught off guard that he hadn’t spoken the words she had been so sure she would hear. Then a deep disappointment settled into her bones. She realized she had been waiting for someone, anyone, to give her permission to move past what Aleksander had done so that they could try again. She wanted some outside force to convince her that her intuition was wrong, that Aleksander was reformed, he wouldn’t pull the same tricks, he wouldn’t try to control or monopolize her career – her _art_ – anymore, he wouldn’t break her into a million pieces again.

There was a war inside her, a clashing of need versus desire. Both sides wanted her to be happy, but through inherently different means. She knew which side she wanted to win, just as much as she knew it couldn’t, not without sacrificing some integral part of herself.

“Stuck?” she asked, barely managing to get the word out.

“Yeah, I mean you have so much going on in your life now, so much that you’ve finally accomplished after working so hard for so long. But it’s like you aren’t quite there, not really. There’s something missing or holding you back, and I think we both know what it is. It’s been months, almost a year really, and I can tell you’re still thinking about him and wishing things had gone differently. But they didn’t, and you’re so tangled up in this that you just can’t seem to move past it. And it’s almost how-- No, it’s exactly how you were with me. You have to figure out a way to let this go, or to work through it, or I’m afraid you’re just going to…. That you’re never going to find yourself again, you know? And I hate seeing you like this. We all do. You’re happy, but only part of you. Because only part of you is really here.”

He fell silent and watched her. His face was hesitant, worried of her reaction, but it was also expectant. She felt like he waiting for some kind of revelation from her, a spark of realization in her eyes followed by a gushing release of feelings.

It pissed her off.

“Oh, do tell me more,” she bit out. “Tell me just how _absent_ I was in our relationship. Tell me how hung up I am on him.”

“You know I didn’t mean it like that,” he said calmly, kindly, reasonably.

She didn’t want reasonable, though. She was sick to death of rationality and the havoc it was wrecking on her heart and mind. She opened her mouth to yell at him.

Then there was a small sound, a shuffling as a nurse crossed the end of the hall, and Alina remembered where she was and why. It was Mal and Zoya’s night. He didn’t have to be sitting next to her, trying to talk to her when he could be - should be, even - resting with Zoya and the baby. He was doing this because, despite his tendency to put his foot in his mouth, he cared about her. So she closed her mouth and let him continue.

“Look, you have this ability to tolerate, to adapt to, impossible situations. It got you through the system. Hell, it got _me_ through. But the time to just tolerate, to just barely get by? That time is over.

“It took me so long to finally realize it for myself, that I could shape my life into what I wanted it to be if I could just figure out what that was. While I was gone, I realized I want stability, belonging, a home. And the person I wanted those the most with was Zoya. Finding out she was pregnant accelerated things more than I would have chosen, and I won’t pretend it didn’t take some adjusting. I know it’s going to take a lot more, too, but this would have been the plan all along. And I’m so thankful I was able to wrap my thick skull around that and to get my shit together for her, for me, for our son.

“I think you have the opposite problem I did. You know exactly what you want, but you don’t think you can point your life in that direction. So instead, you smile and you pretend that what you have is enough. When we were together it wasn’t right for you. I don’t know if it ever would have been, but it was like you had convinced yourself that it had to be. Do you remember what you said when we broke up?”

“I said a lot of things.”

“Yes, but do you remember the reason you gave me, why it wasn’t working?”

She remembered it clearly: _I’m not me when I’m with you_. But she didn’t want to voice it aloud again, because even though she wasn’t with Mal anymore she still didn’t feel like herself. She wasn’t even sure if she knew who her true self was, or if she ever had. Maybe for fleeting moments or even on a handful really good days, but never for a sustained amount of time.

He started to speak again, either thinking she had forgotten or wanting to move past her hesitation. “You told me that you weren’t _you_ when you were with me. You wanted us to work so much that you became somebody else and you… you did it so well that I believed it. And I’m so sorry I did, because most of that was on me. I didn’t want to see that we weren’t working, that I was hurting you. I just….”

He broke off, looking lost in a guilt that Alina didn’t think he deserved. She put a reassuring hand on his arm. “Most of it wasn’t on you. Maybe you should have seen it sooner, but it wasn’t like it was obvious. I was constantly reinforcing this idea of the person I thought I should be for you. I brushed any problems under the rug and convinced both of us that things were exactly the way they should be, the way they always should have been. I think… I think you believed it because for a long time, I believed it, too.”

She let her hand drop to her lap.

Mal was right, she was stuck. This wasn’t about whether or not she should give Aleksander another chance, because deep down she knew that he hadn’t shown that he could be trusted. If any of her friends had come to her asking for advice on a similar problem she would have immediately told them that they deserved better than an asshole who had manipulative - bordering on outright abusive - tendencies.

No, this wasn’t about Aleksander at all. This was about Alina feeling like it might be okay to ignore the pain in her heart, to just give in, make herself small again. To change her shape so she could cram herself into another ill-fitting situation - a home, a relationship, a life - because she was afraid it was the only way she could have him back. Because she didn’t think she could find better, didn’t think she _deserved_ better.

The realization was an earthquake in her heart and she couldn’t stop the resulting tsunami of words that poured from her. She told Mal everything, things she hadn’t even shared with Genya or Zoya. It was rushed and messy, hardly even making sense to her own ears, but Mal followed along anyways. He didn’t ask any questions or try to argue with her harsh self-depreciation. He just held her hands and listened until the tidal waves calmed. It wasn’t until he was sure she had gotten everything out that he spoke.

“I hate what I’m about to say, believe me I do, but from how you tell it, it seems like… at least in his own _seriously_ messed up way, he wanted things to go another way as well. But here’s the real question: does he regret what he did, or does he regret that he didn’t get what he wanted? Because there’s a world of a difference there. One _might_ be worth trying again, but the other….” Mal trailed off with a murderous expression that painted a picture more vivid than any words could have. He sighed and mumbled something that sounded suspiciously like “if only” before he continued.

“He sounds desperate, like he’s grasping for straws. I think he’s trying to apologize to you in the only way he knows while at the same time trying to avoid apologizing at all. I can almost understand that, I’m not the best at admitting when I’m wrong. But even I know now that if you’re really sorry, it’s not about you. It’s not about whether or not you want to say it, or how comfortable you are saying it. It’s about the other person and what they need and what’s important to them. That’s how you care about someone. I don’t know if he can figure that out, but I do know that he has to do better, so much better.”

“Do you think he can do better, though?” She asked, hating the hopeful edge of her voice.

“I’m not sure. But if – and that’s a very big if - Morozova could make you happy, truly happy, that’s what I want for you. No more lies or tricks or manipulations, none of that bullshit. If that is all he has to offer, then you need to wipe your hands of him and really, finally move on.”

“I don’t want to move on,” she admitted softly.

“I know,” he said. “And I kind of hope you won’t have to. Maybe he’ll surprise us. I know that making up with Zoya will probably be the best decision I’ll ever make. I really….” he laughed, but it wasn’t a happy sound. “Honestly whenever I think of him I mostly just want to curb stomp him or something. But even then, I can’t help but wonder if what we have could be the same for you and him. _If_ he does a lot of changing and… I don’t know, soul-searching or whatever.”

“Zoya never betrayed you like he did me. And she is the mother of your child,” she pointed out.

“Zoya’s done her fair share of shit and so have I. But… even if she wasn’t my baby mama, I’d want her to be. I love her. We’re a complete train wreck, but I think we’ve both grown up a lot over the last few months. We both want to try, to work at it. And she loves me, too. That’s worth it.”

“Baby mama? Really, Mal? Really? You have the most disgusting, beautiful soppy look on your face, and even it isn’t enough to distract from how much that makes me want to hurl all over you.”

He gave a sheepish grin. “What? It’s easier to say than ‘the mother of my child.’”

They both laughed until a warm, comfortable silence fell over them.

“I love you, Alina.” He said fondly. And though there were no qualifiers on it, no clarifications, Alina knew exactly what he meant.

“I love you, too.”

Alina toed the ground a little, the plastic of her sole making a soft squeak against the linoleum.

“Promise me you’ll at least talk to him. Even if it’s just to end things once and for all. Especially if it’s just to end it.”

Alina’s heart still clenched painfully at the thought of cutting Aleksander from her life completely. But there was a little hope there, as well. She nodded and Mal stood up.

“Okay. Now I should probably get back to Zoya and our little dude.” He laughed a little to himself, almost like he was dazed. “Our little dude,” he repeated. Then with a shake of his head, he waved and headed back toward the room.

She pulled the phone out of her pocket and turned it over in her hands, it somehow felt heavier than usual. She traced her finger along the crack in it’s screen. It was so late at night - or obscenely early in the morning - but Alina couldn’t hold herself back, she needed to know about him once and for all. If there might be any hope. He had answered her last text right away, and that hadn’t been _too_ long ago, so he was probably still up anyway, right?

She pressed the small phone icon that had been calling to her so strongly.

_Pick up, pick up, pick up._

She was afraid that if he didn’t answer now that she would never have the courage to try again.

  

“Alina? Are you… Is everything okay?” He sounded awake, but slightly confused. At another time she might have laughed. She always loved catching the near unflappable Aleksander Morozova off guard. There was no amusement now though, only apprehension.

“I…. Yes. Well no. I just.…” She gripped her coffee with her free hand and used its heat to ground her in the moment, in what she needed to do and what she needed to say.

“I just….” She paused and swallowed thickly. “I wish you were here,” she admitted quietly into the phone. Silence was all she got in response, and she quickly became nervous. “I mean, not in the delivery room, it was bad enough I had to be there. And I went to lamaze classes.” She crinkled her nose at both the stale memory of the classes and the fresh one of Zoya in labor. It made her think twice about wanting to have any children of her own. “But, you know… somewhere close by.”

“...Somewhere close by.” He repeated slowly.

“I-- Yes.” She said lamely.

“Alina,” He said her name slowly, carefully. It felt like a warning, but for what, she couldn’t be sure. His tone was impossible to read over the phone and she didn’t have his face or body for more clues.

“I… we…. What are we doing? What is this?” She asked Aleksander, but she was really asking herself.

_What am I doing? How in the world did I let Malyen Oretsev talk me into this?_

“What do you want it be?” He murmured into the phone.

More.

She wanted to stop feeling so empty and alone. She wanted him.

But she was afraid. And now she wasn’t sure he could even give her what she wanted.

“I don’t know.” She responded.

There was a muffled noise on the other end of the line. A scoff, a chuckle, a groan, she couldn’t be sure.

“I think you do know. You’re just too stubborn or ashamed to ask for it.”

“I’m not ashamed.” She insisted.

“Then what are you?”

He was driving her to cliff’s edge, hoping she would tumble into a confession. And though she knew that, knew what he was playing at, it didn’t stop her from falling right over the precipice.

Her words came out harsh and fast, “I’m afraid! Okay? I miss you so much that it scares me! What you did was unforgivable, not in the least because you still won’t tell me why. You want me to give you another chance, but you won’t explain anything, and I hate it because even despite that, I find myself wanting to forgive you anyways, and I can’t!” She had to stop to suck in a breath, to keep her voice from cracking. “I won’t. I trusted you, fell in _love_ with you, and you shattered that, you shattered _me_ , then you crushed the pieces under your foot.

“But I’m still here, missing you and wanting to be with you so much every single day that I can’t….” She laughed bitterly. “I can hardly think of anything else. But that can’t happen. Not unless you talk to me, tell me why. And maybe not even then.” She was breathing hard, like she had just tried to run a lap around the hospital, and she turned the speaker end of her phone away from her mouth so he wouldn’t hear.

Aleksander said something, but it was so quiet and garbled that she couldn’t make out the words.

“What?” She twisted the phone back.

There was a muffled groan, unmistakable this time, and even though she couldn’t see him, Alina was sure he was running a beleaguered hand over his face.

“I was scared too, alright?” There was an angry edge to his voice. “I never intended to want you. No. To _need_ you, and it terrifies me. I knew the contract was outrageous and I knew I wasn’t giving you time to review it, but I pushed it anyway. I put up the deadline I did because it would tie you to me, as if I could force you to stay. And even if you didn’t want to once you saw who I was, it wouldn’t matter. You wouldn’t have a choice. I needed to keep you in my life and…. I didn’t know any other way. I couldn’t even begin to imagine another way.”

His words were coming out faster and more tangled than Alina had ever heard them, and by the end, he sounded so bitter, so angry at himself that it made her own heart hurt. She wanted to wrap her arms firmly around him and reassure him it would be okay. She wasn’t sure it would though, couldn’t be sure.

Also, she had to think of herself. Aleksander wasn’t the only one who needed comforting, and she had to stop rushing to act on that deeply ingrained part of herself that insisted on putting others first. So she held back her consoling words and tamped down on that impulse to fix messy situations at the expense of herself. She remained quiet, keeping her own counsel while he continued to talk.

“I miss you and it’s maddening. I have this ache, this need, and you’re constantly on my mind. I spend half of my day checking my phone to see if you’ve texted and the other half thinking about all the things I want to share with you. I’ll see a striking work of art or read something interesting and the first thing I want to do is share it with you. When I have a hard day, I want to see you, to touch you, to come home to you. But you’re not there and it’s... my fault. All of it. I spend more time than I care to admit remembering the sound of your laugh or the way your face looks when you concentrate. I even _dream_ about you, when I can sleep at all.”

  
His tone was taut, like a canvas stretched over a frame. “I don’t know what I need to say or do to make you trust me again, and I haven’t tried anything else because….” He sighed heavily, seemingly burdened by what he had to say. “Because for the first time in as long as I can remember, I care more about another person than I do myself. I want you to be happy, I want that more than anything else. Even if… even if you would be happier without me. Because as much as I can’t function anymore without you here, it would be worse knowing you were suffering.”  
  
The unfairness of it hit her square in the chest and made her feel like she could hardly breathe. He was stripping the last of her sanity, her patience, from her with every word. She wanted to scream, she wanted to break down into a sobbing mess, she wanted to go to wherever he was and fall into his arms.

  
Instead what she said was, “Fuck you.”  
  
“…Excuse me?”

“I said,” she pushed the words out between gritted teeth. “Fuck. You. You don’t get to do this! You don’t get to give up just because this is harder than you thought it would be! You don’t get to pretend that I’m not _already_ suffering, that I would magically be happier without you! You say that you can change, and sometimes I think I see of flicker of that, but you still don’t understand what you did to me. Why I’m suffering.

“Aleks, you believed in me, you listened to me, you took me for who I was. You made me believe in _myself._ Do you know how many times I’ve had that in my life? None. Not like that. And then you took all of it and just threw it away. You acted like you didn’t even care! And then you had the gall to say I betrayed you? Should I have run to Mal the way I did? No. But I didn’t betray you, Aleksander. After what you did, I didn’t owe you anything. You ended things between us the minute you accepted that signed contract from me.”

She deflated and the righteous anger slowly seeped out of her. In its place settled hollow exhaustion.

“Can you imagine… can you put yourself in my shoes? I was this fragile thing, just starting to gain a modicum of the confidence that you’ve had all your life. And you _ruined_ me. And you made me think it was my own fault. So I needed something… I needed someone who I knew was real. He was safe, and I could trust him when I no longer trusted myself. He kept me from coming apart that night, and for a long time after. He’s the reason I survived you. Was it a mistake? Absolutely. It was for both of us, but we were each other's life raft. And I’m not sure I can be sorry for it.”  
  
She paused. “No, I’m not sorry for it. I won’t be. That’s what honesty looks like. It hurts to hear it, and if I’m being honest, it hurt to say it. But honesty is how you know what’s real and what’s not, and it’s how you know where you are and who you’re dealing with. No tricks. No manipulations. No lies.

“Aleks, you can’t control people like that. Even if it works that doesn’t mean it’s ok. Not just for me, but for anyone, and I’m still not sure if you understand that. Sometime I wonder if you’re still playing the same game, just adjusting to what you think are new rules. If you’re trying to change, or if you’re just telling me what I want to hear to get me back. No matter how scared you were that I would leave you - even though I did - it’s not right.”

She tried to keep her voice level at what she was about to say, but there was a shake to it that she couldn’t stop. “I…. I can’t go back to you. I won’t. I want to, _Saints_ I want to, but I refuse be in a relationship with someone who would manipulate and use me like that. So If you want me back, if you want what we had, then you need to somehow prove to me that you can, and will, be the man I fell in love with. Mistakes are okay, little ones, here and there, they happen. But, if you can’t do that, if you aren’t willing and able to see it through, not just until you have me back, but for as long as we’re together then just….” Her voice broke a little and she suddenly realized that she was crying, big fat tears that burned on their way down. She rubbed at her eyes, as if she could force the tears back in.

“If any part of you ever really cared about me, tell me it was all an act. Please. Just tell me you never actually cared and that all of it was a lie, especially the good parts, when you were safe, and kind, and so sweet. Because if you can’t treat me right, then I need you to just be the bad guy. Just be some asshole who I can finally walk away from without this clawing need to keep looking back. Because I can’t keep doing this. I won’t survive it. I’m finally making changes in my life and in myself that I’m proud of. I’ve fought too hard to risk them like that”  
  
A long time passed before Aleksander finally spoke. He cleared his throat, the sudden noise startling her, and his voice sounded thick. “...I can’t tell you what you want to hear, that I’m one or the other, the good guy or the bad guy, because that’s too simplistic and it wouldn’t be true. I won’t lie to you, not anymore. I would understand if you don’t want to give me another chance. But I won’t pretend like you weren’t everything to me, not for one moment, not for anything. I fucked up, utterly, but it was never because I didn’t care about you. It was because I didn’t know what I really wanted until I tore it to shreds. No, that’s not right. I just….  
  
“I want to be enough for you, _more_ than enough, but I know that still won’t erase what I did to you. I- I’m trying.” He sounded so vulnerable, so sincere. “I want to be better for you, for us. Not just to win you back, and not just for the chance to prove to you I can deserve you. It’s for me as well. That’s probably selfish, but… I’m considering things in ways I haven’t before, and it’s making me question so many things I’ve done, and why. I’m trying, but I feel like I’m just fumbling in the dark and I can’t--” he tried to clear his throat again, but his voice was still thick.

“I can’t do this without you anymore. I love you. I love you so much and I am so very sorry,” he enunciated in a way that made Alina feel the heavy weight of remorse in every syllable. “I’m sorry I manipulated you. I’m sorry I ever thought to use you. I can’t fathom the idea of it now. I look back and I hate the man who wanted to do that to you, hate that I _was_ that man. I’m sorry I broke your trust. That I tried to gloss over what I’d done. The idea that you came so close to breaking, knowing I did that to you--”

It was a moment before he went on. Alina waited in silence, barely breathing in anticipation.

“I’m sorry I don’t know how to fix this, to fix _me_. I just…. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I know now that I don’t deserve another chance with you. You’ve indulged me so much already and I shouldn’t still be asking for more. But I have to.” He paused. “I want to be better. I think I need you to know I can be, even if no one else ever does.”

Tears streamed down Alina’s face, falling freely and unchecked.  
  
He had finally apologized. It wasn’t an excuse. It wasn’t a complex argument or a transference of blame. It wasn’t another promise that rang hollow. It was messy, ineloquent, and distraught. It was sincere.  
  
For the first time in too long, she felt the stirrings of hope without a sticky residue of guilt.  
  
She still wasn’t ready to trust him, but she finally believed him. She didn’t forgive him, but she was willing to let him try.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter took so long to write (I don’t even want to check to see how many months… oh god... I looked and it’s been 6 months *vomits a little*), but it’s finally here now! There is one more chapter planned, because I’m kinda a monster. But I'm not even going to try to give an estimate on when it will be done, just know that someday it will be!
> 
> HUGE special thanks to [Ahab2631](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ahab2631/pseuds/Ahab2631) who beta-ed this for me. (Any typos or dubious grammar that remain I claim solely as my own.) --Ahab, I could have done this without you, but it wouldn’t have been nearly as good nor as fun to write. *worries about the proper usage of "nor"* Thank you for encouraging me, fixing mah poor grammar, inspiring me, and laughing with me. You are a truly amazing soul and I’m so lucky to have you as a fwiend.-- If you guys haven’t checked out her work yet, I honestly have no idea what you are even doing in this fandom. My favorite fic of hers is [I Don't Even Know](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11864049/chapters/26788488), but honestly all of them are amazing and I’ve read them multiple times (except the abridged/PG version of her trilogy rewrite for reasons… obvious smutty reasons.)
> 
> Also fun fact, the pet name for this fic is now “Shit in the Dark” or just “Shit” because of a glorious typo I made. Auto-correct is a blessing and a curse my friends.


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